News with Nuance: June 16, 2023

Your Friday dose of News with Nuance: the week's biggest stories, unpacked + more ..

Dear Readers,

I don’t know about you, but it has been a weird week over here.

The news seems to be - in a lot of ways - particularly exhausting. While the first-ever indictment of a former American president should be big breaking news, while watching and reading coverage of Donald Trump’s indictment on federal charges for, among other things, “conspiracy to obstruct justice,” and “violations of national security laws,” all I felt was kind of a sick sense of deja vu. There’s the circling of the wagons of Republicans and right-wing commentators. The hand-wringing of Democrats and left-wing commentators. I’m glad the justice system is attempting to hold Trump accountable. I just can’t write about him anymore. Now, it’s up to the legal system to do what the legislators didn’t.

Beyond Trump, there’s a counteroffensive finally underway in Ukraine - sending anxiety and hope across Western Europe and the U.S. And here in Minnesota, we had our worst-ever record day of air quality, with smoke drifting down from climate-change influenced Canadian wildfires, leading to outdoor youth sports cancellations on Wednesday night.

This was all a weird backdrop to the last week of school for my kids. While Ukrainian soldiers tensed for their big push, and lawyers pored over documents in Florida, and the sun glowed deep red in Minnesota; earlier in the week I watched euphoric kids run around fields and playgrounds, and chatted with teachers and parents about what had been, by most accounts, a successful and positive school year. There’s nothing like watching the smiles of your kids as they grow up, alternately self-conscious and overjoyed; energetic and tired; sweat pooling underneath their chins as they lick bright red popsicles melting in the sun.

Somewhere in the midst of world events, our lives march on. Here in News with Nuance, I’m going to attempt to balance both parts: acknowledging the global challenges, and also lifting up the ordinary people who are choosing to hope and love anyway, and invest in the future of this fragile world. Like you!

And a special note to any teachers reading this: happy end of school! Thanks for all you do. The impact you make in young peoples’ lives is unmeasurable.

Signs outside Richneck Elementary School in Newport News, Va., express support for a first-grade teacher who was shot by a 6-year-old student.

Photo by Denise Lavoie, Associated Press

The Headline: Virginia teacher shot by 6-year-old student has resigned, school officials say

Starting off this week’s End of School edition of News with Nuance with a follow-up to a very troubling story out of Virginia. It was here that first grade teacher, Abby Zwerner, was shot in the hand and chest by one of her students on Jan. 6. She spent nearly two weeks in the hospital and had to undergo multiple surgeries, and she continues to suffer debilitating pain, according to this article.

Zwerner filed a lawsuit against the school district in April, and the next month, news came out that she was no longer with the district as an employee; her lawyer contending that Zwerner had been fired. This article characterized Zwerner’s departure as a resignation.

Whatever the legal details, I thought this follow-up story was important to mention here for a number of reasons. As reports came out after the shooting indicating the student shooter had a long history of violent actions and likely trauma in the home leading to behavioral and mental health problems. He had also strangled and choked his kindergarten teacher the year before.

Doubtless, school administrators were weighing a host of complex issues when it came to caring for this boy and his family, as well as caring for students, teachers and staff. Well-documented data has shown racial disparities in disciplinary actions taken by schools, and it’s also likely the school wanted to do everything possible to give this young child a shot at education and a health environment at school that he didn’t have at home.

At the same time, this case also shows how sometimes school administrators can become part of the problem when it comes to maintaining safety for students, teachers, and staff. Often more isolated from the day-to-day management of students and classrooms, and often (especially in high-poverty schools and districts) lacking years of experience or education in school administration, administrators can be ill-equipped to deal with difficult cases like the one presented here.

Heartbreakingly, this case ended with a young teacher in the hospital, enduring injuries that she’ll likely deal with for the rest of her life; as well as the prosecution of a student’s mother for neglect, and a young child who has now nearly killed his teacher with a gun - something that will also impact him for the rest of his life.

What I found most troubling in this story is the school district’s seeming inability to take any culpability for its role in so much pain and carnage. Instead, the district questioned Ms. Zwerner’s claim that she should “be able to reasonably expect to work with young children who pose no danger.”

The district, in its defense, cited the large number of incidents of violence against teachers. That fact notwithstanding - should we not ask school administrators and leaders to try and hold a different standard, and to expect something better for students and teachers? In an atmosphere where no one can “reasonably expect to be free from danger,” how can anyone possibly teach or learn?

The Quote:

Zwerner’s attorneys have said school officials knew the boy “had a history of random violence” at school and at home, including an episode the year before in which he “strangled and choked” his kindergarten teacher.

“Teachers’ concerns with John Doe’s behavior [were] regularly brought to the attention of Richneck Elementary School administration, and the concerns were always dismissed,” the lawsuit states.

In asking a judge to dismiss the case, the school board has argued that Zwerner’s injuries fall under the state’s workers’ compensation act.

The school board rejected Zwerner’s claim that she could reasonably expect to work with young children who pose no danger, pointing to numerous incidents of violence against teachers across the U.S. and in Newport News.

“While in an ideal world, young children would not pose any danger to others, including their teachers, this is sadly not reality,” the board stated.

Story by Ben Finley, Associated Press

The Headline: She survived a White House lightning strike. Could she survive what came next?

This is a very good, long, read from one of the Washington Post’s best storytellers, William Wan. I liked it because it does something that I’m also attempting to do in this newsletter, which is to go beyond the attention-grabbing headlines or one-off events, and follow up with a deeper story of what happens after the news cameras go away, and you go on living after suffering great loss.

Amber Escudero-Kontostathis is the lone survivor of the Aug. 4, 2022, lightning storm in Washington, D.C., that killed three other people sheltering with her under a tree across from the White House.