Bathroom Cameras a Good Thing, Says School

Karen, the problem with having students clean bathrooms at school is proper techiques need to be used so the student, toilet cleaner, does not become ill with some kind of infectious material. It is one thing to clean ones own bathroom.
A school bathroom or public bathroom has many people using the facilities. One spash that lands on broken skin could cause a very serious illiness.
If this minority of students that causes all these problems are not careful enough to stay out of trouble why should they be trusted to use proper cleaning techniques. I can just see one student getting sick from doing this task and then spreading it through the school.
I do not have problems with students who are causing problems doing certain kinds of cleaning. In fact I think in certain situations it is a great idea.

I don't currently have children in school, but when I did it wasn't the kids place to clean the bathrooms..cmon ppl. were any of you made to clean the bathrooms when you were in school?..no. it was understood that the janitors were PAID TO CLEAN THE BATHROOMS. most of us pay taxes which pay the custodians/janitors to clean. kids go to school to learn. not to learn to clean a bathroom. you obviously don't have any children or you don't pay taxes and believe its your childrens place to clean a bathroom. now...if these kids cleaning the bathroom were the ones who emptied the soap dispensers or whatever, then yes..they should be made to clean their mess...as far as cameras, whatever happened to teachers, principals, etc. whom are paid by our tax dollars keeping frequent check on what is going on in the bathrooms. they sure did when I was a kid. apparently they have sooooo much more to do now that we have computers and things are supposed to be easier....

Hi, I am a teacher and a mother. I agree that cameras in the bathroom make since if there is a problem that is either affecting the saftey of our students or the condition of our school. Usually at our school the misuse of paper resaults in stopped up toilets,, which causes water, urine, and fecies on the floor. We also sometimes have problems with older students picking on the younger ones, fights, and drugs. I believe that if the cameras are installed then there should be doors on all of the stalls.
As for cleaning public batahrooms I would not expect my daughter to do it unless she had caused the problem in which I would supply the toothbrush for her to use on all of the toilets. I believe that we let students off way to easy which enables them to make an excuse for their behavior and do it again.

The objection to cleaning the public bathroom is that it is a health THREAT. E-coli, Salmonella, AIDS and other deadly illnesses.

The health threat is grossly over stated. Can you name one incident of someone being infected in a bathroom? Either cleaning it or even using it? People think it is dangerous but it is not.

I don't expect the kids to clean sufficiently, and as mentioned there are custodial crews.

But I'll be honest, I think most of you think your kid is too good to clean up after someone else. Some of you even said you don't want them cleaning up after someone else. Why? Why is your kids more special than the custodial crew?

There is an issue where you have to be overly careful with chemicals, but I have news for you - the custodial crews do not really take any extra percautions. We just over protect our children.

This is simply parents thinking their kids are too good for bathroom duty. Plain and simple. They think their kids are above cleaning someone else's pee and poo whether you are willing to admit it or not. You may cover the complaint with medical/chemical fears, but I ain't buying it.

I think having the kids take a turn cleaning - and grossing them out in the process - is a great lesson when a problem is school wide. I guarantee you even the good kids are wasteful, miss the trashcan, etc. occasionally, and it is also a good lesson to teach them that they aren't better than the custodial crew. I've seen how children treat them. They look down on them and the parents encourage it with just the type of responses seen here.

You are CLEARLY not a teacher and haven't been in touch with the young people that populate the schools today...I'm a teacher and they are ANIMALS....filthy mouths, disrespectful to adults, lazy (do almost no homework, when they do it's the bare minimum, and don't care to turn it in on time!)...don't study for tests and cry when they don't like the scores (manipulative) and "tell" on you to the faculty when you so much as raise your voice...in short, they've set this situation up for themselves...(they also "ACCUSE" teachers of things that they never did and have their friends swear to it...just to get "strict" teachers fired...G-d forbid the school face a lawsuit...they fired a teacher like a hot potato...even when the teacher's done nothing wrong!)

Anyhow, bathrooms are where they go to smoke, hide out instead of going to class...as long as they're not aimed at the stalls they are completely appropriate! I read both Brave New World and 1984 and they have no bearing on this discussion whatsoever!

My beginning message should have said: we've tried the punishment thing. If you don't catch them, kids aren't really likely to snitch. And it takes up so much instruction time trying to get to the bottom of it. Too much instruction time is loss DAILY due to bad behavior with the kids. In the 70s bad behavior daily was an exception. In 2008, bad behavior is the NORM and we're happy when we have 30 minutes or more of uninterrupted instruction; or a full lesson without interruption due to behavior. That's WONDERFUL. We "shout out" at faculty meetings monthly for those of us who has had a full week of a lesson of uninterrupted instruction. Out of a faculty of 100, there may be 15 teachers who may have a full week of uninterrupted instruction (no behavior problems). But it has to be 30 minutes or more and it has to occur everyday during that week. It just doesn't happen. And I may be leaving out some particulars of how it is suppose to work. We call it Monthly Shout Out. Some SUPERMAN teachers will have 2 weeks or even 3 weeks (P.E., Music, Drama classes, Family Consumer Life, stuff like that). And it's done on the honor system, meaning the teacher is expected to be truthful. Not venting or complaining, just sharing with you all, like the custodian did of what's going on why UK is resorting to this. And perhaps we'll get to this in America. Of course, some schools are better than others. Some PTSA have monitors for the bathroom daily. And they get in the kids "stuff" like there's no tomorrow. Unfortunately, we don't have that at our grasp at the school I'm at. I wish you all the best, wherever are. But before you throw up smokescreens and talk about what "I'd personally would like or not like", deal with the issues. Comparing it to what I'd want in my home or not want has no bearing on whether this is needed in our schools. I know how to act at my house, so they don't need to monitor my emails. Simple. Compare apples to apples. Studies show that those who shift attention to what another person may like or not like as it relates to a particular issue usually aren't functioning at the same intellectual level as those who are dialoguing about the issue. Deall with the issue. This is what is happening. What can be done about it? Simple. What I like, don't like, would have, would tolerate, etc.; isn't the issue. I really favor the rice field concept. Because the person who said we wouldn't want our emails monitored and cameras in our home, etc.; would probably have ended up in a rice field at age 8. You usually can tell pretty early whether someone is of academia or a field laborer.

Yea, Brave New World was a great big. I read it in school...the place the government made me go last year "for my own good." I know that I, like every other student in America, complained about school, but I have to say I think mandatory enrollment is a beneficial thing and will not turn me into some mindless drone..;.get where I'm headed with this???

Read the link provided at the beginning - it says that there is footage of the toilets as well, but it's only looked at if an "incident" is reported. Do you really believe that?

One person quoted mentioned toilets. It's in there.

Well I apologize. I do however think that kids are really out of control these days. They need constant supervision, especially in areas like bathrooms where privacy leads to chaos rather quickly. My kids school had a couple of boys that sat in the bathroom and threatened anyone that came in that they were going to get a "swirly". As in, hold their head in the toilet and flush it. I understand that some people may think that some pervert is going to watch the girls pee or whatever, but what if it catches the girls that are misbehaving? It's a catch 22.