Does Skyline school bear any responsibility?

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Question for Skyline parents or Portland Schools parents, in general.

On a typical Friday at the end of the school year or even right before a holiday vacation, what percentage of students might not attend school because their families are leaving on trips? Given the busy-ness of the day on June 4 with both the Science Fair and afternoon Talent Show, would some students just not come to school because so little classroom time was scheduled? Maybe some students and/or parents weren't interested in the Science Fair or Talent Show and decided that it wasn't worthwhile to be at school that day. jmo

I would think that since school ended in only 10 or so days, most kids would be in school. Why plan a vacation for June 4th, when it was only another week or so until all the kids would be out of school?
And wasn't the fair only until 10?
 
I would think that since school ended in only 10 or so days, most kids would be in school. Why plan a vacation for June 4th, when it was only another week or so until all the kids would be out of school?
And wasn't the fair only until 10?

I'm thinking about where I live and how lots of folks enjoy late spring/summer/early fall long weekends "up north" (Michigan) at cottages, lodges, etc. Plenty of parents in these parts don't hesitate to schedule family trips during holiday breaks and will take children out of school early for a cruise or resort vacation.

I was mostly wondering about whether or not Portland parents would want to jump-start a long weekend and skip the shortened school day: Classes starting at 10:00, lunch at 11:30 or so, outdoor recesses, then the Talent Show in the afternoon. The altered schedule doesn't leave much time for academics, students would be in high spirits with the excitement of the special events of the day, and not much would be accomplished.

Weren't Desiree and Tony planning to take Kyron on a fishing trip that weekend? That's what I'm referring to. Some parents might have thought that the little time that would be spent in the classroom that Friday wasn't worthwhile and that the family would just take off for a long weekend together. I probably wouldn't have condoned this as a teacher, and DH and I never did this as parents, but I know that it's a common practice where we live.
 
Aye, but wouldn't that be THE "smoking gun"? Why the heel would she still be free if that were the case?



.

maybe they have a lead on where Kyron is....and until they have him? (this is pure speculation on my part)
 
alright, Ive read this whole thread before offering my two cents. I do feel that the school is partially responsible. At this time, we cannot prove who took Kyron, or when he was taken. If it was TH, what makes the school any less responsible because she was known to the child?! If it was a stranger abduction, how is that worse than a parental or family abduction? To me, the whole issue should have come to light when phone calls go out to the parents regarding his absence. EVERY school should have that policy in place. Think of how many abused and neglected children we read about, that could have been noticed sooner, if daily attendence calls were made. And these calls cannot be automated, they need to actually reach a human being. If parents cannot be reached, go to the next on the list, right on down until you get a human on the phone. Just imagine if someone called you about your neice or nephew 3 days in a row, and you hadn't heard from your sis, you'd be worried enough to check up wouldnt you?
In this case, without the proper signed note, and paperwork, the child should not have been allowed to leave for the mystery Dr.s appointment. Period. Thats the policy they have in place, and it needs to be followed, every day, not just some days or regular days, or non science fair days. The problem here is that we do not know if the teacher was even told of the dr appointment for certain, AND noone saw Kyron leave apparently. How the hello does that even happen? NONE of the security measures in place were followed, and they weren't strong enough or proactive enough even if they were followed.
Im thankful to send my children to a small rural school. Our security is lax though. Im glad we have small classes, and everyone knows everyone. There are about 150 students K-12. There are no sign in sign out procedures, but there are absentee calls. The children are mostly bused, but we do have walkers, my children included. Teachers line up outside down the front walkway to greet the students every morning, and the same at dismissal. Its organized chaos for sure. There are no cameras, no security gaurds, no buzzer, and multiple doors to enter and exit. It would be easy to misplace a child, BUT! there are absentee calls, and they keep calling until they reach you or someone on the list. I think that is the biggest issue with the security at skyline truly, if only they had made the calls, Kyrons absence would have been known so much sooner, and it would have been much easier to find the truth in his disappearance.
 
alright, Ive read this whole thread before offering my two cents. I do feel that the school is partially responsible. At this time, we cannot prove who took Kyron, or when he was taken. If it was TH, what makes the school any less responsible because she was known to the child?! If it was a stranger abduction, how is that worse than a parental or family abduction? To me, the whole issue should have come to light when phone calls go out to the parents regarding his absence. EVERY school should have that policy in place. Think of how many abused and neglected children we read about, that could have been noticed sooner, if daily attendence calls were made. And these calls cannot be automated, they need to actually reach a human being. If parents cannot be reached, go to the next on the list, right on down until you get a human on the phone. Just imagine if someone called you about your neice or nephew 3 days in a row, and you hadn't heard from your sis, you'd be worried enough to check up wouldnt you?
In this case, without the proper signed note, and paperwork, the child should not have been allowed to leave for the mystery Dr.s appointment. Period. Thats the policy they have in place, and it needs to be followed, every day, not just some days or regular days, or non science fair days. The problem here is that we do not know if the teacher was even told of the dr appointment for certain, AND noone saw Kyron leave apparently. How the hello does that even happen? NONE of the security measures in place were followed, and they weren't strong enough or proactive enough even if they were followed.
Im thankful to send my children to a small rural school. Our security is lax though. Im glad we have small classes, and everyone knows everyone. There are about 150 students K-12. There are no sign in sign out procedures, but there are absentee calls. The children are mostly bused, but we do have walkers, my children included. Teachers line up outside down the front walkway to greet the students every morning, and the same at dismissal. Its organized chaos for sure. There are no cameras, no security gaurds, no buzzer, and multiple doors to enter and exit. It would be easy to misplace a child, BUT! there are absentee calls, and they keep calling until they reach you or someone on the list. I think that is the biggest issue with the security at skyline truly, if only they had made the calls, Kyrons absence would have been known so much sooner, and it would have been much easier to find the truth in his disappearance.

*unless* his step mom followed the process and signed him out.....how would an absentee phone call help? How could the school possibly be liable in that situation?
 
*unless* his step mom followed the process and signed him out.....how would an absentee phone call help? How could the school possibly be liable in that situation?

Except we have two conflicting situations: The student who told the teacher he didn't see Kyron, only to be reassured by the teacher that Ky was probably in the bathroom; or alternatively, the teacher accepting "across a crowded gym" Terri's statement that she was taking Ky off to a dr's appointment. One of these can only be true, and then we have to weigh in the third option; that of Terri's statement that she told the teacher she was going to go look at other exhibits, and wondering how the teacher could confuse that with taking Ky to a Dr's appt. with baby K.
 
Except we have two conflicting situations: The student who told the teacher he didn't see Kyron, only to be reassured by the teacher that Ky was probably in the bathroom; or alternatively, the teacher accepting "across a crowded gym" Terri's statement that she was taking Ky off to a dr's appointment. One of these can only be true, and then we have to weigh in the third option; that of Terri's statement that she told the teacher she was going to go look at other exhibits, and wondering how the teacher could confuse that with taking Ky to a Dr's appt. with baby K.

I'm not sure why you think only one of those can be true. IMO they could easily all have happened. According to Terri's friend JF the doctor's appointment was spoken of on Thursday and the timing of that appointment was apparently less than clearly expressed, heard or understood. Terri may also have said something to the effect that they're going to look at other exhibits. IMO there is no conflict that prevents these conversations both having taken place; the only conflict is that JF in her interview and Terri in her email seem to attribute the teacher's alleged confusion to different conversations. Not knowing what the teacher told her about any of this, we could speculate that maybe Terri is not sure why there was confusion and which bit of her speech got misunderstood and had several different parallel theories, or maybe the teacher said something that caused her to dismiss the exhibits confusion theory and made her realize that the conversation on Thursday was the source of the confusion.

On Friday morning when the chaperon (it was actually a female "sub", according to the student, not the student himself) said she didn't see Kyron the teacher might not have remembered the Thursday conversation right away or she might not have thought it was relevant at that point because she had the impression the appointment was on a different day or later in the day so Kyron wouldn't have left yet. Since he was seen there early in the morning it would have been a pretty reasonable expectation that the Hormans had planned for him to be there for at least for the first lesson. I'm sure many children wouldn't have been there with their parents at 8:15 before the classes started if they were planning to leave together before the school officially started at 8:45, they'd just have skipped the voluntary early morning science fair tour altogether and gone straight to the doctor's appointment. Then later she may have put one and two together to arrive at four and thought she misunderstood and Kyron already left for his appointment (supposing Terri didn't say confusing things on purpose to deliberately make her confused).

If what I've envisioned is what happened the school policy should IMO be changed so that teachers would rely less on assumptions, inferences and more easily misunderstood spoken communication and always demand written excuse notes from the parents. It probably wouldn't have changed the outcome because someone who wants to abduct a child will try to sneak him out without leaving an excuse note and you'd need security cameras or monitoring staff at all exits which they didn't have but it would have got the alarm out faster if they had communicated with the parents.

There was a small child missing at my son's school last year, and he was missed right away when he didn't get off the school bus and meet the teacher's aide. They expect parents to call in sick days before the school bus arrives and his parents hadn't called. They called the bus driver who said his bus was empty and the parents got informed right away and the police and the school staff were out searching almost immediately. Not sure that sort of response would have made a difference for Kyron but it might have for some other child. If you suppose that Kyron had wandered away on his own he could have got much farther in eight hours than in a half hour and would have been harder to find the more delay there was.

The story at my son's school had a happy end since the child was found sleeping in the bus less than an hour later. The bus driver hadn't seen him because he was so small so it was just a human error but the case was reassuring for me because the response to the kid missing alert was so prompt. IMO schools should require that parents call in any absences in advance.
 
*unless* his step mom followed the process and signed him out.....how would an absentee phone call help? How could the school possibly be liable in that situation?

Well that would help the case if she had indeed signed Kyron out. At the very least LE would KNOW who he left with, and at what time he had left! Those are crucial pieces of information as to his current whereabouts. If this signout took place, Im willing to put money on TH would be in custody at this very moment. The schools repsonsibility is to know without a doubt where each of its students are at all times during the school day. That is why they have sign out policies. They need to be accountable until the sign out occurs, and then the child becomes the parent's responsibility. If we had a sign out sheet, we would be so much closer to finding out what happened to this sweet boy.
 
My elementary school doesn't do an absentee phone call. My oldest son started middle school this year and they do absentee calls there. He was absent yesterday and I got the call at 7pm last night. I'm not sure why it took so long to get the call, cuz they do attendance in 1st period.
 
Aedrys has started a thread to discuss safety issues at Skyline following a meeting of parents at which Kaine Horman spoke:

[ame="http://www.websleuths.com/forums/showthread.php?t=113500"]Kaine assures Skyline Parents their kids are safe. - Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community[/ame]
 
Dear Skyline School Community and Neighbors:

Many of you are aware that on May 2, 2010, more than 125 volunteers from Sunset Presbyterian spent the day at Skyline School doing inside and outside projects. With the help of several Skyline parents, students and neighbors the amount of work that was done that day was truly amazing. In a continuing effort to support our school and complete the work started on May 2nd, Sunset Presbyterian volunteers will be returning on Sunday, August 29th for “Skyline Service Day”. Here are some of the projects that we will be doing:

* Finish painting exterior metal handrails.
* Finish painting trim in two classrooms.
* Paint one wall in the library.
* Clean out and reorganize “volunteer” room and “locker rooms” in basement of school.
* Landscaping around the school.
* Track maintenance


This will be our 10th and final year as Skyline parents and we are thrilled to partner with Sunset Presbyterian church for Skyline Service Day. This has been a difficult last few months for our Skyline staff and families, and we want to make sure that our school looks especially great when our kids return to class in September. As the project leaders we are seeking additional volunteers for the day from the Skyline community. In addition, we are looking for donations of water and snacks that we can provide to the volunteers during the day. If you are unable to volunteer we are also seeking monetary donations to help fund the purchase of supplies (paint, equipment, bark dust, etc.) needed for the day.

If you can help out in any capacity please contact us at maggieschweinfurth@comcast.net. Thanks so much!

Maggie and Bill Schweinfurth

http://srnpdx.org/current_newsline


Am I the only one who wonders if some of this maintenance being done at this particular time might just be covering up some future potential evidence? Or would it be too late for something like that to still be gathered if an important tip came up?
 
Here's how the school sits in relation to NSEW, with exits marked.
skylineschool.jpg

There is another exit on the north side facing the soccer field. I've seen it with my own eyes! Maybe the kids can't get out that way or it goes to a janitor's area, but it's there.
 
Am I the only one who wonders if some of this maintenance being done at this particular time might just be covering up some future potential evidence? Or would it be too late for something like that to still be gathered if an important tip came up?

If there was any evidence LE should have had it by now. They were doing this August 29, LE have had since June 4. jmo
 
2/3 blend? There are a lot of those in the PPS system.

We call them "splits" in these parts, but it's most likely a similar concept. Students in both grade levels are in the same classroom with a teacher who is very capable and well-organized. Students in this type of classroom are generally able to work independently on assignments while the teacher is engaged with their classmates. Teachers at both grade levels usually share instruction time for certain subjects: One of the teachers might teach Math while the other teacher handles Reading and/or Language Arts skills. One teacher might teach Science, while the other teacher does Social Studies. Younger students benefit from being placed with older classmates, and older students learn to work and progress independently.
 
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