A Colorado father says that a middle school teacher cut about eight inches of hair off of his son, a special needs student, without permission from his parents.
“I cannot believe that this happened,” Xander Scotland, whose family are naturalists and have Cherokee heritage, told KKCO. “I cannot believe that it got to the point that she was actually cutting hair off of my child and still hadn’t crossed her mind that she was doing something wrong.”
Scotland’s son, who is also named Xander, is a new student at Redlands Middle School in Grand Junction. He has special needs that were not specified.
When the boy got home, he informed his parents that the teacher, Anne Shoffstall, said things that made him think he would get punished if he didn’t submit to the hair cut.
A teacher at Redlands Middle School allegedly cut nearly eight inches of hair off of a student without his parent’s permission. The family are naturalists and are of Cherokee heritage. Family’s reaction at 10. https://t.co/Aln1CHzKeo
— Grace Reader (@GraceReaderTV) May 22, 2019
“It’s about consent, it’s really unfortunate that something like this could happen in a public school,” Scotland said. “Everybody that we talked to seems to agree that it’s just completely outrageous, but yet nobody is doing anything to help us and he’s not being compensated and we just kind of feel molested.”
Scotland said that he has told his son to obey his teachers so what happened was especially painful.
“I remind him every day that these people are here to help you and you need to listen to what adults tell you,” Scotland told The Daily Sentinel.
“Then the teacher singled him out and said, ‘You have split ends and it’s really bad,’ and she said she could fix it. He thought he was doing something really bad, so between that and me reminding him to trust people … his exact words were, ‘I don’t want anything bad to happen.'”
The boy told his dad the teacher made him feel like he would be in trouble if he didn’t let her do it. https://t.co/d4ZFgGI9R8
— NBC12 WWBT Richmond (@NBC12) May 22, 2019
Most of his male relatives do not cut their hair as part of their traditions, he added.
“It takes years and dedication to take care of hair, and this lady took a year of progress in a matter of minutes with a pair of safety scissors,” he said.
A spokesperson for District 51, the school district, told KKCO that the teacher is still at her job and is being investigated. Scotland told the broadcaster that he’s surprised she wasn’t fired.
A district spokeswoman confirmed to the Sentinel that a probe has been launched.
“All the right people are involved and investigating it and are making sure they have the full story and making sure they know what to do next,” spokeswoman Emily Shockley said. “They are looking into it and taking it seriously.”
Teacher Charged for Cutting Student’s Hair
After a teacher cut off a student’s hair in California last year, she was charged with six misdemeanors, including one count of false imprisonment, two counts of cruelty to a child, and two counts of battery.
If convicted on all charges, Margaret Gieszinger faced up to three-and-a-half years in jail, according to Tulare County District Attorney’s Office. Her hearing hasn’t taken place as of May.
Gieszinger told police officers she she was sorry that a student’s hair got cut but “it was already done.”
“She said that she had to do it for (the foreign exchange student) who had been acting like ‘a ding dong,’” a police report about the incident said. “She said that she was sorry that (the other student’s) hair got cut, but that it was already done.”
The exchange student was living at the teacher’s home, reported ABC 30, which obtained the police report.
