(GHENT, N.Y., July 17th, 2003, 3:30 p.m.) -- More
than a dozen parents have removed their children from an alternative,
private school located in a rural upstate county amid complaints about
disciplinary tactics by one teacher.
Claire
McConnell, who apologized in a letter June 24, was accused of strapping
one child into a chair with a leather belt, tying the hands of others
and taping shut the mouths of some elementary school students, the
Albany Times Union reported Thursday.
Parents said the
tactics were out of character for the Hawthorne Valley School, a Waldorf
school that designs programs to reflect the emotional, physical and
intellectual development in children.
McConnell, daughter of U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., did not immediately return phone messages. "She's a young teacher, a learning teacher," Patrice Maynard, a teacher and mentor to McConnell, told the newspaper.
She referred further questions to a letter promising that "errors in disciplinary action would not be repeated."
Bob
Wohlfeld and DeeAnn Veeder, whose daughter had been tied to her chair
when she wouldn't settle down, removed her after she finished second
grade in June.
"We were a little dumbstruck," Wohlfeld said.
The
school 25 miles south of Albany has about 300 students in grades K-12.
Bill Hirschen, a state Education Department spokesman, said corporal punishment is forbidden in public schools, but the "law is silent" on the matter of private schools.
