Parents Outraged that Elementary School Uses Padded Solitary Confinement Cell to Punish Students

Government schools have been children’s prisons for a very long time, but in recent years with metal detectors and on guard police officers it has gotten even more blatant.

At one Elementary school in Longview, WA the administrators have even installed a solitary confinement cell that they use to punish students, even throwing special needs children into the cell also.

According to local news channel KATU:

A concerned mother who posted photos of an ‘isolation booth’ in a Longview elementary school on Facebook said she wanted other parents to know how the school uses the space. Ana Bate said her son saw the booth in use at Mint Valley Elementary School, and had questions. The school principal said the padded room is used for students who have behavioral disabilities.

Sandy Catt the spokeswoman for the school district responded by saying “I believe that room has served a good therapeutic purpose and there may be improvements. I think we need to look at the information that’s been gathered to determine where to go from here.” She added that the school asked permission of the parents individually before using this room on any of the students.

Ana Bate, a concerned mother told reporters “How come they’re not providing documentation about how this ‘therapeutic booth’ is beneficial? Show me some real numbers. Show me something from the medical community that says more times than not and all the documentation that backs it up. Don’t tell me ‘well, their parents said we could do it.’”

However, according to other parents who have had previous issues with the school, their children were placed in solitary confinement without their permission.

KATU News interviewed one of these parents, according to their recent report:

Candace Dawson, who now lives in Marysville, Wash., has a son who used to go to Mint Valley Elementary three years ago. She said the school put her child in the booth without her permission.

‘He said that’s the naughty room,’ Dawson told KATU News Wednesday. ‘That’s what he called it. He said when kids are naughty they get put in there.’

She said she had no idea the school had the isolation room until she went online and saw her son’s old school was in the news. She asked her son about it. She said he got very uncomfortable and told her not only did he recognize the pictures of it online but his teacher forced him to spend time there.

Dawson said her son does have some behavior problems but said she would never OK the school to send her son to this room.”

Now in the age of the Internet, formal education is obsolete. Children will teach themselves what they need to learn if they are in the proper environment, and a state institution is far from the proper environment. However, it is a place for them to be indoctrinated, and that’s exactly what happens, that’s exactly why the whole education system exists to begin with.

Many of the things that children learn in government schools are not through books, but from subconscious lessons that are embedded into the overall structure of the school day. Walking in lines, asking to speak or go to the bathroom and being entirely obedient to those in authority are some of the most obvious ways that children are “socialized” into becoming obedient, unquestioning citizens.

This project is just an example of the system moving that much further down the line and building upon the methods of indoctrination that are already in place. Many studies have shown that solitary confinement can have a severe impact on the mental health of adults and there is no telling of what kind happen to children who are put into these situations.

The solitary confinement room is being challenged in this particular district, but this practice is still commonplace throughout many areas in the pacific northwest.

J.G. Vibes is the author of an 87 chapter counter culture textbook called Alchemy of the Modern Renaissance, a staff writer and reporter for The Intel Hub and host of a show called Voluntary Hippie Radio.

You can keep up with his work, which includes free podcasts, free e-books & free audiobooks at his website www.aotmr.com