Colorado boy, 6, suspended for kissing a girl

[Mr. Television]

http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/11/living...-kissing-girl/

6-year-old suspended for kissing girl, accused of sexual harassment
By Kelly Wallace, CNN
updated 4:20 PM EST, Wed December 11, 2013


Editor's note: Kelly Wallace is CNN's digital correspondent and editor-at-large covering family, career and life. Read her other columns and follow her reports at CNN Parents and on Twitter.

(CNN) -- This is another one of those stories that seems absolutely hard to believe.

A 6-year-old boy near Colorado Springs, Colorado, was suspended from school for kissing a girl on the hand. You read that correctly.

"It was during class," first-grader Hunter Yelton said in an interview with CNN affiliate KRDO. "We were doing reading group, and I leaned over and kissed her on the hand. That's what happened."

Not only did Hunter's peck get him suspended from school, but the school accused him of sexual harassment, KRDO reported.

Hunter's mom, Jennifer Saunders, is outraged.

"This is taking it to an extreme that doesn't need to be met with a 6-year-old," Saunders told KRDO. Now my son's asking questions, 'What is sex, mommy?'"


She said Hunter had problems at school before, getting suspended for rough-housing and for kissing the same girl on the cheek. The family has been working with him on "class disruptions" by grounding him and giving him "big restrictions," Saunders said.

Robin Gooldy, the superintendent of Cañon City Schools, told KRDO that Hunter's record will remain within the district and that his behavior fits the school policy description of sexual harassment, which includes unwanted touching.

"Our main interest in this is having the behavior stop because the story is not just about the student that was disciplined, it is also about the student receiving the unwanted advances," Gooldy told HLN. "We have to think about both students in the situation."

Saunders said the girl in question was "fine with it" because Hunter and the girl consider themselves "boyfriend and girlfriend." The girl's parents have not commented publicly on the issue. But Saunders wants her son's record cleared of anything suggesting sexual harassment.

On Wednesday, Saunders told CNN that the boy's school principal would ask the superintendent to reconsider removing the term sexual harassment from Hunter's record. The superintendent did not return a phone call from CNN.

"Remove it from his record," Saunders told KRDO. "I need to stand up and fight for him. I can't just let that happen because it's not the case. It's not what happened at all."

Hunter for his part said he feels "sorry" for doing something wrong and tries to be good in school.

"But I just have a lot of energy. Six-year-olds, they have a lot of energy," Hunter said.


They sure do, and as a parent of a 6-year-old and a 7-year-old, an innocent peck on the cheek or on the hand seems as natural for kids this age as declarations of who they plan to marry.

They don't know anything about sex or sexual harassment. So how on earth can they be accused of such behavior?

Reaction online to Hunter's story has been swift, with the majority of commenters expressing pure outrage.

"The school probably traumatized the kid for life with that stupid move," wrote Brenda Esselman on the Facebook page for "New Day."

"Poor child, he's (too) young to even know what sexual harassment is," Ortencia Solis also wrote on Facebook.

"Another example of how we are now overreacting to something as simple as a childhood crush," Benny Barboza wrote.

Eric Vetch, also on Facebook, said he kissed a girl when he was 6. His punishment? "I remember writing on the chalkboard 'I will not kiss girls at school,' and it was a private Christian school ... go figure."

On the other side, there are a small number of people voicing some support for the school's actions.

"The kid shouldn't go around kissing someone's child. Because if it was my daughter, the parents and I would be talking. Let's keep it real," Russell M. Walker wrote on Facebook.

We clearly need to hear more from the school and the school's district because this might turn out to be another case where the pressure to follow set school rules gets in the way of common sense.

We saw this recently with two other stories: the Long Island school heavily criticized for banning most ball playing and even requiring supervision of games of tag while the school yard was under construction, and in Boston, where a student who allegedly went to a party to drive a friend home who was drunk was suspended from playing on her school's volleyball team.

[Ryan Chamberlain]

So stupid. And, then the schools wanna teach sex-ed to younger kids. LOL. Can someone say....hypocrites!

I did the same thing when I was 6. I was in the same class as my neighbor who I had a crush on and a grabbed him under the desk and kissed him. I did get in trouble. I was moved into a different classroom. But, not suspended (Granted...this was 1993)

[Steve_uk]

Originally Posted by Stuck In The '70's

http://www.ctvnews.ca/world/colorado...girl-1.1584425

Colorado boy, 6, suspended for kissing a girl




Steven K. Paulson, The Associated Press
Published Wednesday, December 11, 2013 7:40AM EST
Last Updated Wednesday, December 11, 2013 8:26AM EST

DENVER -- The suspension of a six-year-old boy for kissing a girl at school is raising questions about whether the peck should be considered sexual harassment.

The boy's mother said officials at Lincoln School of Science and Technology in Canon City, a southern Colorado city of 16,000, are over-reacting. Jennifer Saunders said her son was suspended once before for kissing the girl and had other disciplinary problems, and she was surprised to find out that he would be forced out of school again for several days.

First grader Hunter Yelton told KRDO-TV that he has a crush on a girl at school and she likes him back.


The boy also has a sexual harassment record on his hands after the kissing incident.

"It was during class, yeah. We were doing reading group, and I leaned over and kissed her on the hand. That's what happened," he said.

Saunders said she saw nothing wrong with her son's display of affection. She said she punished him for other problems in school, including rough-housing. She was shocked when the school's principal brought up the term "sexual harassment" during a meeting.

"This is taking it to an extreme that doesn't need to be met with a six year old. Now my son is asking questions. What is sex mommy? That should not ever be said, sex. Not in a sentence with a six-year-old," she said.

District superintendent Robin Gooldy told The Associated Press on Tuesday the boy was suspended because of a policy against unwanted touching.

"The focus needs to be on his behavior. We usually try to get the student to stop, but if it continues, we need to take action and it sometimes rises to the level of suspension," he said.

He said officials have not heard from the girl's parents, and no legal action is anticipated because it was only a violation of school policy.

In recent years, Colorado and other states have been moving to relax zero-tolerance disciplinary policies blamed for increasing the dropout rate and giving students criminal records for relatively minor infractions. However, those policies have dealt mostly with safety issues, such as students fighting or bringing a replica gun to school, not sexual harassment.

Dr. David Welsh, a school psychologist, said some policies that bar bullying, harassment and weapons on public school campuses may go too far, but school boards are being forced to develop strict policies and follow them to the letter because of a large number of complaints being reported by students and teachers who face consequences if they keep silent.

"If you have a policy and procedure and you don't follow it, it's hard to defend," Welsh said.

The boy's suspension ended on Tuesday. School officials refused to say if the he was back in class, and his mother did not return a phone call seeking comment.

A child psychologist told KRDO that tough love in this case could have negative consequences. She said kissing is normal behavior for children of that age.

"For most six-year-old boys, absolutely. That would be a normal behavior," said Sandy Wurtele, a child clinical psychologist who specializes in child sexual development and the prevention of childhood sexual abuse.

Wurtele said she was surprised to hear the school suspended him.

"That really gives mixed messages, negative messages to the kids," she said. "This part of development is just as important if not more than their academic subjects."

Wurtele said children at that age are simply curious about the differences between boys and girls.

The question I suppose psychiatrists need to answer is whether such behaviour can lead on in adolescence to indecent assault and even rape. Apparently the girl did not object but this is surely irrelevant at such an age and I presume her parents had already contacted the school authorities on the matter on a previous instance,yet this has been ignored again by the boy. I sometimes think it's far easier these days to communicate by letter than having both sets of parents round the table to discuss Hunter's discipline problems in general and for him to be moved away from the girl in particular,change class or even school if the problem recurs.

[Mr. Television]

Originally Posted by Ryan Chamberlain

So stupid. And, then the schools wanna teach sex-ed to younger kids. LOL. Can someone say....hypocrites!

I did the same thing when I was 6. I was in the same class as my neighbor who I had a crush on and a grabbed him under the desk and kissed him. I did get in trouble. I was moved into a different classroom. But, not suspended (Granted...this was 1993)

I was 6 in 1971. This happened all the time when I was in school. Nothing was ever done about it. It was just kids being kids. Nobody thought anything of it. I'm glad I'm not in school anymore and I'm glad that I don't have any kids in school. The PC police is ridiculous nowadays.

[Ryan Chamberlain]

Originally Posted by Stuck In The '70's

I was 6 in 1971. This happened all the time when I was in school. Nothing was ever done about it. It was just kids being kids. Nobody thought anything of it. I'm glad I'm not in school anymore and I'm glad that I don't have any kids in school. The PC police is ridiculous nowadays.

Yep. They are totally insane. It's like we are all living in a nanny state.

[cleverfun3000]

It's Called. . .



..and it's better that he learn now thru a brief suspension, than later with a 15 year jail term. You really got to get to these children while they are young because once they become a teenager, they can become a threat to society.

[Nighthawk76]

I think that educators need to put more energy into getting test scores up and not worrying about two little kids kissing each other.

[Mr. Television]

Originally Posted by Nighthawk76

I think that educators need to put more energy into getting test scores up and not worrying about two little kids kissing each other.

Exactly. These 2 kids are 6 years old. They don't even know what they're doing.

[Zoneboy]

Originally Posted by cleverfun3000

It's Called. . .



..and it's better that he learn now thru a brief suspension, than later with a 15 year jail term. You really got to get to these children while they are young because once they become a teenager, they can become a threat to society.

He becomes a teenager in 7 years so that gives you and the rest of society plenty of time to start quaking in your boots.

[Wawwie]

Originally Posted by Stuck In The '70's

Exactly. These 2 kids are 6 years old. They don't even know what they're doing.

The boy is an aggressive little brat who was invading the personal space of an innocent girl. This isn't the first time this cave boy took it upon himself to kiss the girl. After the first incident, the girl told the boy to "knock it off" but the kid couldn't resist making unwanted advances a second time. The boy was warned. Seeing as how that didn't work, he was suspended. He deserves it. Who is this kid to think he can invade the little girl's personal space because he feels like it?