INDIANAPOLIS — Indianapolis Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Aleesia Johnson is sharing her first public response to the incident in which a teacher allegedly filmed and encouraged a student to attack another student who has special needs.
13News previously asked IPS to discuss the incident after a lawsuit was filed on behalf of the 7-year-old boy and his mother on April 16. All requests for public comment were denied. Instead, the school district released Johnson's response in a video more than a week later that was addressed to students, staff and families.
"It has been an incredibly tough time for our community the last few days," Johnson said in her update April 24. She described the now-viral video as "appalling and disturbing."
The IPS Board of School Commissioners are holding an "action session" at 6 p.m. Thursday, April 25 at Arsenal Tech High School. 13News has learned close to 20 parents have already signed up to speak at the board meeting. These parents have voiced concerns, not only about the video of the assault, but how it was handled by school and district leaders.
Anyone wanting to make a public comment at the meeting is required to register at this link. Written comments can be submitted at this link.
For those who can't attend in-person, the meeting will be livestreamed at this link.
The alleged incident caught on camera happened at George Washington Carver Montessori IPS School 87, located at 2411 Indianapolis Ave. near Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Street and Fall Creek Boulevard.
The recorded incident came to light during a parent-teacher conference on Nov. 1. Parents were meeting with the teacher, regarding the 7-year-old boy's mother's concerns as to what was happening at the school.
During the parent-teacher conference, the teacher was allegedly going to show a video of the classroom environment to the parents. However, instead of showing that video, he inadvertently began showing a different video, in which the 7-year-old boy was being attacked by another student.
(NOTE: 13News is not sharing the full video of the attack, which was sent by the boy's and his mother's lawyers. In the report, 13News has also decided to remove the audio of the boy being attacked due to the disturbing nature of the incident.)
"'Are you done yet?' That's the teacher saying that to these children as he's beating up on this little boy. 'Are you done yet?' It's shocking," said Tammy Meyer, who is one of the attorneys representing the family.
In the video, you can hear the attacking child continually say, "don't mess with me," while the boy getting hit is crying.
Toward the end of the video, the 7-year-old boy who was attacked can be heard saying through his cries, "I didn't mess with him," before the person recording the video is heard telling the boys to "go back to your spot."
Johnson shared an update about what IPS is doing since the incident:
- Bringing on an external partner to gather information regarding this specific incident and school climate at George Washington Carver through stakeholder interviews with parents, students and staff
- Completing a thorough review of the district's relevant policies, protocols and procedures
- Engaging in an external review of those same relevant protocols and policies to ensure the district has all necessary systems in place.
The IPS Board of School Commissioners met Tuesday night to convene a task force on student safety and wellbeing. The task force will provide an update to the community in the next 30 days.
"We take our kids' safety very seriously. We will continue to examine and strengthen our practices to determine the areas in which we can act more effectively. Our students, our staff and our families deserve nothing less," Johnson said.
13News is continuing to reach out to IPS for additional information.
On April 17, IPS released the following statement about the investigation:
"IPS does not tolerate the type of behavior alleged in the complaint and takes reports of potential abuse and neglect seriously. When IPS learned of the teacher’s conduct, the Department of Child Services (DCS) was immediately notified, and the teacher was removed from the classroom and suspended. The teacher had no further contact with students and is no longer employed by IPS.
- IPS was not aware of any fights encouraged or sanctioned by this or any other teacher from the student’s parents or otherwise, until the parent emailed the principal at 6:58 p.m. Oct. 30.
- The principal first viewed this email early morning the next day (Oct 31), and immediately contacted DCS and IPS Human Resources.
- The teacher was immediately removed from the building and never returned to the classroom.
- The teacher was interviewed by Human Resources on November 2 as part of its investigation into the matter. The employee resigned during that meeting before IPS could initiate termination proceedings, which the district was prepared to do based on the information received from the internal investigation.
Because this matter is the subject of pending litigation, it is inappropriate to comment further on our investigation of this matter."