Wrestlers expelled; coaches suspended

Tuesday, January 10, 2006

By Kati Phillips
Staff writerIn a disciplinary move that stunned parents and reduced teenage boys to tears, leaders at Argo Community High School on Monday suspended three coaches and expelled three varsity wrestlers for hazing on a team bus.

The coaches each will miss nine meets and practices and be docked pay for their absence. Their suspensions will be staggered so as to have as little impact on competition as possible. A fourth coach will receive a letter of reprimand, officials said.

The varsity wrestlers will be allowed to finish out the year at an alternative school but are banned from extracurricular activities. The two seniors can receive a diploma from Argo, and the junior can return to his home school next year, officials said.

The punishments were doled out by unanimous vote of the School District 217 board. They were prompted by what some parents characterized as a harmless prank, but what others saw as sexual abuse.

On the ride home from a romping victory over Bremen High School on Dec. 1, upperclassmen wrestlers allegedly "teabagged" five to seven members of the freshmen team.

The older boys pulled the freshmen, one by one, to the back of the bus. While two boys held down a victim, the third shoved his ********* in the victim's face.

Four of the five wrestling coaches were on the bus at the time and did not notice any disturbance, which members of the team attribute to the loud celebration of the 67-0 victory that lasted the entire ride back to Summit.

In the wake of the hazing, school board president Eugene Wroblewski said procedures will be created to guarantee better supervision on all activity buses. A more detailed description of hazing also will be added to the disciplinary code.

"This is not acceptable behavior," he said. "To take no action is to condone it."

The senior boy who exposed himself was turned in to the administration after bragging about the teabagging at school, parents said.

A wrestler who was not victimized told his parents about the incident and word quickly spread to other parents, coaches and school officials.

The tight-knit group of freshmen parents, many of whom know each other from football or junior high honors programs, demanded the upperclassmen be held accountable.

The students were suspended from school and wrestling for 10 days, but at least two victims' parents planned to press criminal charges if the students were not expelled. Summit police have said teabagging would constitute misdemeanor battery.

"If they expel, I'll be happy with that decision," said one victim's mother before the school board meeting.

But neither the freshmen parents nor their kids were prepared for the coaches to be suspended.

Freshmen mother Laura Ashley submitted a letter to the board in the coaches' defense. She said the coaches sit toward the front of the bus to separate the one female wrestler and girl managers from the boys. When the coaches learned of the hazing, they took action to prevent it from happening again.

"Taking these coaches away from the wrestlers and forcing the blame for someone else's actions on these coaches will only hurt the boys who have already been hurt by this incident, and that is the freshman wrestlers," she wrote in the letter.

Many parents and wrestlers admitted they have heard, seen and even participated in similar hazing incidents at Argo or other schools. And they defended initiation as part of athletics from the high school to professional level.

Wrestler Jon Shue was one who said he'd heard stories about hazing at Argo but thought it was no big deal — until he saw the fallout of this incident Monday night.

"I'm a junior, and I'll make sure this never happens again," he said.

The coaches sat up front to protect the females?? ALL of them? I don't buy that they didn't know what was going on on that bus. Those parents should have proceeded with criminal charges and those coaches should have been fired. But in some jobs you can pretty much do whatever you want. People are losing their homes through taxes to pay for this "education".

Shut down the whole school. Fire ALL of the staff. This bureaucratic institution has led it's "learners" to learn that competative pressure is the paramount skill. Defeat and disdain those who are [physically] [certainally not mentally] weaker given the particular situation. Waht the he**ll, this is what education is all about anyway...... shut down all the schools and substitute some learning for the bs of "education".

if someone tried to do that to one of my boys he'd lose his 'nards, no anaesthetic.

then he wouldn't be able to do it again.

*BEG*

Local talk radio, WLS AM, had a call in segment on this topic. Fully half of the callers, mostly women, posisted that "boys will be boys", and thus the school was "overreacting".

Schools keep blathering on about their necessity because they represent the real world. Well, in the real world, if somebody held down a person while another rubbbed their genitals in his face they'd be facing 10 yrs plus in the slammer. However,in
the
synthetic world of school they have women, of all people, rationalizing sexual assault/battery as "boys will be boys". God help us all.

During the call-in show most of the male callers were repulsed,as was I, by the actions of the thugs. Maybe father does know best?

One caller said that the actions of these criminals was similar to actions of prisoners in a correctional institution setting. Schools likened to prisons? Nahhh......

Very insightful re: father knows best and prison behavior. "Boys will be boys"??? Good grief! Where are their brains?