Teacher Shouldn’t Have Belittled Students Who Found Stolen
Pickup Trucks
Teacher Shouldn’t Have Belittled Students Who Found Stolen Pickup Trucks
Editor,
Regarding the article “Students Cleaning Riverbed Find Stolen Vehicles” (Dec. 5):
Motivating students and our community to become involved and aware is vital to our future and I applaud the efforts of all of the San Benito High School students who were involved in the riverbed cleanup.
One group of students was singled out for finding two stolen vehicles and responsibly reporting their find to their teacher.
To set the story straight, two of the “boys” were girls.
A positive story quickly deteriorated when I read the comments of Mr. Jim Ostdick, a SBHS teacher, who publicly belittled student efforts by saying the students were more interested in possible reward money than in the cleanup of the riverbed.
To add injury to insult Mr. Ostdick then said something to the effect that “maybe he needed to go buy them McDonald’s gift certificates” as a reward.
I happened to be on the receiving end when my daughter received a call from the students involved.
Finding the trucks was reward in itself. They were excited to have made such a find.
A monetary reward was not their motivation.
A personal, public apology to the students involved would be appropriate.
Perhaps Mr. Ostdick could benefit in training to be a positive role model.
He might learn from watching the students he belittled.
There are several of those students who are terrific student leaders and positive role models for their peers.
Students would also benefit from having a teacher as a positive role model.
Kim Taylor
Hollister
