THE POST BELOW WAS INITIALLY MADE IN DECEMBER 2019.
WE LATER EXPOSED A COVERUP BASED AROUND THE CRIME OF TAXPAYER FUNDS BEING STOLEN FROM THE SCHOOL BY AN EMPLOYEE IN THE SUMMER OF 2022 AND ISSUED OUR FINAL REPORT IN SEPTEMBER WITH THIS TIMELINE:
In response to one of tips received on the Anonymous Tipping System and posted to this site, the the Executive Director of McAuliffe scolded us privately and then publicly posted the info below.
The Framingham Source alerted the Executive Director of the anonymous tip above, being posted to FU, and led to the Executive Directors response below.
As an executive director, you should be able to handle the complex situations that arise in the course of a school day, and need to equally handle the public reaction in cases where the in-school response was not sufficient. A sixth grader going down with a head injury could be equally traumatic to young witnesses themselves. This looks like it might have been the case.
Private scolding:
“I am appalled that whoever moderates this page would allow for posting of a school-related anonymous tip potentially damaging to the school and individuals involved without first getting a statement from the school. Your practice only serves to propagate false and potentially harmful information in our Framingham community. Please, going forward, ask me for information about things regarding McAuliffe so that what you write / share is not just based on a single anonymous report. Thank you for considering my request. Kristin Harrison, Exec Director of McAuliffe Charter”
Public Response posted by Kristin Harrison, Executive Director of McAuliffe in response to our post on Facebook:
“First of all, I ask that families communicate directly with school officials instead of posting on anonymous tip pages that serve to create and / or feed into rumor mills.
FACTS:
There was a physical altercation between two students on Friday, during indoor recess, I believe. The supervising teacher asked the front desk to call the police, which is not our typical procedure as we have faculty trained in house to respond to escalated behavior such as this. It never hurts to have police support but I’m not sure they needed to be called in this situation. We’re still reviewing steps taken to respond and following that will clarify internal v external procedures.
Unfortunately, physical altercations do happen at times. When they happen, it’s typically during unstructured times like recess following miscommunication or a friendly game that gets out of hand. Sometimes scholars have lagging skills when it comes to navigating conflicts and may respond physically instead of in other safe, appropriate, and constructive ways. This is one of those instances. Disciplinary procedures were followed on Friday with relevant consequences assigned promptly.
Our communications procedure for incidents like this involves communicating first and foremost with the families of students immediately involved. In some cases additional communication is made to other families or the whole school community. At no point should anyone at McAuliffe ever tell students to not tell families about things that happen at school – this allegation very much surprises me and I doubt was the case. Any family who believes this was the case should email me and Dean of Students, Drew Rosenshine, immediately. Additionally, if a family is concerned about lack of communication regarding an alleged incident, I encourage them to contact us instead of anonymously posting tips to media sources. This may well be a situation that warranted additional communication that we missed – in part due to other things going in that day like a community meeting at the YMCA. We need to hear from families directly to get feedback and consider if additional communicatiomn is necessary.
If you have questions or concerns, email me at kharrison@mcauliffecharter.org.”
Our Concerns
“There was a physical altercation between two students on Friday, during indoor recess, I believe. – You need to know, if you don’t know, you need to find out before responding.
The supervising teacher asked the front desk to call the police, which is not our typical procedure as we have faculty trained in house to respond to escalated behavior such as this. It never hurts to have police support but I’m not sure they needed to be called in this situation. – So you don’t trust your teachers to make appropriate judgement calls, nor do you trust our men in blue to be able to adapt to situations of varying behaviorally escalated levels. Why do all the other schools call the police when a serious incidents occur? Why do you think your school is better than the others?
At no point should anyone at McAuliffe ever tell students to not tell families about things that happen at school – this allegation very much surprises me and I doubt was the case. – Certainly sixth graders may not always be the most reliable to directly quote what was exactly said, however you doubting the allegations outright is exactly why this page exists. But go ahead and sweep under the rug.
Additionally, if a family is concerned about lack of communication regarding an alleged incident, I encourage them to contact us instead of anonymously posting tips to media sources. – Framingham Unfiltered provides a means for parents frustrated with the lack of transparency after multiple attempts of going through proper channels to affect change. The other schools have improved communications on student incidents.
This may well be a situation that warranted additional communication that we missed – in part due to other things going in that day like a community meeting at the YMCA. – Certainly blame that you were too busy to appropriately respond.
From the Private Scolding:
I am appalled that whoever moderates this page would allow for posting of a school-related anonymous tip potentially damaging to the school and individuals involved without first getting a statements from the school. Your practice only serves to propagate false and potentially harmful information in our Framingham community. – In your own response to the incident you acknowledge that something did happen. How false was our tip really? You don’t even know for sure where the incident actually happened. You make a lot of assumptions in your response. In this climate, for the safety of our children, we need honesty, a situation explained, an a plan for better communications next time. This here, was not provided.