Misleading headline explained by teacher after student inquiry

Along with never-ending examples of the Hapsburg family's imprint on western civilization, my favorite high school history teacher drilled into me a certain outlook on life.

"As you get older," he used to say, "right and wrong won't be black and white anymore. They'll be more like shades of gray."

I saw the wisdom of that philosophy more than ever this week.

At Monday's school board meeting, I heard an outraged parent speak about a violent article being read and used for instruction in her daughter's special education class at Kimball Middle School.

That article, of which Mary Pat Hirschberg of Elgin read an excerpt, detailed the arrest of Rosario James and Jordan Sallis, both Southern Illinois University students. Jordan and Sallis, Madison County police said, kidnapped and tortured a teenager by beating him with a wooden paddle, burning his neck and shoulders with cookies after taking them from the oven, shaving off some of his hair and pouring urine over him from a soda bottle.

Hirschberg said she was "appalled" such a story would be used in a special education classroom setting. She is now requesting a written explanation from the district.

Leaving that meeting, I was appalled too. Why would such a horrific event be the focus of a lesson in a special needs class? This teacher, I thought, surely must be off her rocker.

However, a phone call to Kimball Middle School found principal Alan Tamburrino shocked that I'd heard about the problem, citing the article's use as a "non-issue."

The article, Tamburrino explained, was brought up in class by a student.

It's headline talked about a "cookie bandit," and the student thought the story had something to do with stealing cookies, he said.

The Kimball teacher, instead of dismissing the student's question, turned the query into an example of how newspaper headlines can sometimes be unrepresentative of the story below.

What started off as a simple black and white turned gray for me in just a few short minutes.

Is it wrong to teach about violence in the classroom? Maybe.

But should such questions be ignored or dismissed in an attempt to shield students from real world happenings? Certainly not.

As a reporter, I can only hope for an audience that takes more than a first glance at the stories I cover.

I hope the U-46 school board will do the same with this issue.