Saturday, April 18, 2015

Statement Analysis of Emails: Mason High School Principal Mindy McCarty-Stew


Aqsa Parez

Mason High School Principal wanted to "celebrate diversity" with a "Covered Girl Challenge" having students wear Muslim coverings called "hijabs."

It was met with anger particularly with a reminder about Aqsa Parvez, who was put to death for being seen outdoors without her hijab.  Diversity without discernment for diversity's sake is to indicate a disregard for thinking itself, even while coming from a school.  

The principal of Mason High School has canceled the day as it came to light not only regarding the offense to women, but that it promoted Islam, while ignoring the murdering of women and girls, genital mutilation and "honor killing" within Islamic nations.  In quoting the Koran, another gay man was put to death, replete with photos.

The school was met with not only responses from parents, but also from those outside the school, around the country.  
Mindy McCarty-Stewart announced cancellation of the Covered Girl Challenge to be held after school on Thursday, April 23, in an email made public late Thursday. 
I.  The Email
II.  General Analysis Guidelines
III.  The Email with Analysis    

I. “This  communication should not have come from our Student Activities Department because this was a student-led initiative, rather than a school-sponsored activity,” McCarty-Stewart wrote in the email. “We will put procedures into place in the future that ensure that any communication from a school email is for a school-sponsored event, and not merely supported by a student-run group.
“As the event spread beyond our school community, however, we received many strong messages that made me reconsider the event’s ability to meet its objectives. I now realize that as adults we should have given our students better guidance. After much consideration and after talking with the student event organizers, we have cancelled the event.”
II.  General Guidelines 
Emails use the same principles of Statement Analysis with paradigm shifting.  For example, some emails are written in non-complete sentences, with others dropping all pronouns. 
What we do is this:
Look at the context of the email. 
If, for example, it is written in broken sentences, we consider this the baseline or norm.  If a sentence, thereof, is produced that is complete, we note that it indicates importance, as it not only broke the norm, but goes against the law of economy:  it took more effort. 
If an email drops pronouns, we can accept this as its baseline, thus noting carefully if a pronoun is used.  We would consider this sentence, with the pronoun, very important to the subject, as it not only took more effort, but it produced the instinctive pronoun as well.
Leadership:
We often find:
Good news uses the pronoun "I", while bad news will more often use the pronoun "we" or "us."
Psychologically, it is the same as we see in guilty statements where one does not want to be "alone" with guilt (or responsibility) but wishes to dilute it by either hiding in a crowd, or by 'spreading it around.'

III.  The Email with Analysis 

“This previous communication (above) should not have come from our Student Activities Department because this was a student-led initiative, rather than a school-sponsored activity.  
Always note where an email begins as important to the subject.  The first sentence is important. Here, it is in the negative, making it even more important.  The origin of the initial communication's path is addressed and it is explained why.  
This first sentence seeks to make certain that readers of the email see a difference between "school sponsored" events and "student-led activities."
One might question if this was an attempt to alleviate responsibility by shifting it to the students.  This then may imply that student led initiatives are 'unknown' to facility, as it stands.  Yet, this is not what is stated.  Hence, a critical area for us:
Statement Analysis deals with what one says, while follow up questions deal with what one may seek to imply.  It will lead to questions about oversight of "student-led initiatives" versus "school-sponsored."
Please note the change of language:
a.  student "led" versus school "sponsored", which then does lead to questions such as:
In the personal, internal subjective dictionary of the principal (subject), 
1. what is "sponsored"?
2.  What is the difference between "led" and "sponsored"?
3.  Is there money or funding involved in sponsored? 
4.  Are student "led" events different from 
b.  Also note:  "initiative" versus "activity", which both needing clarification by similar follow up questions.  
What is the difference between a "event" and an "activity"?  
Since the subject took the time to type out different words, they should have different meanings.  
What is an "initiative"?
What is an "activity"?
How are these different?
There should be a justification for the change, and this justification may simply be found within definition.  It is not known by the context, however, which shows the need for questions.  
Do students conduct "initiatives" while the school sponsors "activities"? 
This leads us to discussion:  Since girls were asked to wear Muslim coverings, would the wearing of this apparel constitute an activity?
Do initiatives need permission slips?
Do student initiatives warrant parental notification?
Do student initiatives warrant faculty oversight?
The statement raised questions to be asked. 
We will put procedures into place in the future that ensure that any communication from a school email is for a school-sponsored event, and not merely supported by a student-run group.

It is important to follow pronouns to learn responsibility. If an email is written in representation of a group, like the school, it should be consistently in the plural.  When an email goes from the plural to the singular, it should be considered a very important sentence:  
“As the event spread beyond our school community, however, we received many strong messages that made me reconsider the event’s ability to meet its objectives. I now realize that as adults we should have given our students better guidance. After much consideration and after talking with the student event organizers, we have cancelled the event.”

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

OT: Clinton misrepresents her family history

http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/16/politics/hillary-clinton-2016-grandparents/index.html

Washington (CNN)During a conversation on immigration reform, Hillary Clinton told a small audience in Norwalk, Iowa on Wednesday that "all my grandparents, you know, came over here."

The reality is, however, that only one of the presidential candidate's four grandparents were immigrants to the United States.

-Akula

Anonymous said...

This principal is sure "Stew"pid. then to blame it on the kids. Aqsa Parez or Parvez or whatever is a very good example of why this puts OUR kids in danger. Boo!

GetThem said...

It reminds me of an episode of Degrassi The Next Generation when Fareeza wears her muslim head piece to school and sets up a demonstration regarding Muslims and then the other kids destroy her presentation and write "Terrorist" on it. In the end, everyone learns more about their own differences.
_______
The principal may lose her job over this, or "resign."

M

Anonymous said...

OT: Nurse on trial for killing three patients declares ''I'm unlucky but I'm no killer''
Victorino Chua said his "bitter nurse confession" related to things he'd done as a teenager rather than the deaths of Tracey Arden, Derek Weaver and Arnold Lancaster

The “bitter nurse confession” written by an alleged hospital killer was a complaint about the “bad luck” in his life, he told a court on Thursday.

Victorino Chua insisted that his self description of “an angel turned into an evil person” was not related to the poisoning spree which killed three patients and injured eighteen others.

He clashed with prosecution barrister Peter Wright QC over the letter which had been found in a kitchen drawer at his home after his arrest.

Chua, 49, repeatedly denied that he had contaminated saline drips and ampoules with insulin at Stepping Hill hospital in Stockport, Greater Manchester in June and July 2011.

The court has heard that three patients died and eighteen others needed treatment after suffering hypoglycaemic attacks following insulin poisoning.

He was cross-examined by Mr Wright yesterday over the meaning of phrases within the letter, which Chua had described as “the bitter nurse confession.”

Mr Wright asked: “What were you bitter about?”

Chua replied: “I was bitter, I was having bad luck. It follows me to the present. It was non-stop. Those were the words which came into my mind.”

The former nurse told Manchester crown court he was “confessing” to “bad things” he had done as a boy and a teenager in the Philipines.

He said: “The bad memories are coming back to my mind like a flashback. I went to see my doctor about it. I said I am having hard times because I am having flashbacks. I asked him if he could refer me to have some ECT (electro convulsive therapy).”

Mr Wright asked: “But what were you confessing to? Have you something to confess?”

Chua replied: “No.”

Mr Wright asked about a phrase “I will go straight to hell - no question ask.”

Chua said: “I told the police about that. All these things I did when I was young which are evil deeds - evil doings so that I will go straight to hell.”

He said the phrase describing himself as “an angel turned into an evil person” was prompted by the onset of depression.

“All my friends know I am kind person. When I developed depression, they said I had changed - especially my wife. I was an angel when I did not have depression and now I am evil because I have depression.

“It is only evil thoughts - not evil deeds. This letter is not related to contamination or alterations. It does not mean that I was wanting to do contamination or alterations.”

He admitted that he had problems in his relations with other members of the nursing staff at the hospital and had referred to it in his letter as “an anger which will explode and they will be sorry.”

Mr Wright said: “They are going to be sorry because you are going to cause huge mischief at your place of work.”

Chua said: “That is not true. It is not the patients I have a problem with, it is the staff. Why will I include the patients? They have nothing to do with the problem.”

Chua denies the murder of patients Tracey Arden, 44, Derek Weaver, 83, and Arnold Lancaster, 71, in June and July 2011 when they were patients on two wards. He also denies poisoning or attempting to poison eighteen other patients.

The trial continues.

- http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/nurse-trial-killing-three-patients-5533860

Anonymous said...

OT:The nurse accused of murdering and poisoning patients at Stepping Hill hospital in Stockport is an innocent man being used as a scapegoat, a court has heard.Victorino Chua, 49, was left to “carry the can” after the police poured huge resources into finding the killer poisoning patients apparently at random at Stepping Hill Hospital in Stockport, his lawyer said.Chua, a father of two, is also alleged to have deliberately altered the dosages on prescription charts while working as a staff nurse on wards A1 and A3. In all, 21 patients suffered as a result of his alleged actions, with three of them murdered – Tracey Arden, 44, Arnold Lancaster, 71, and Derek Weaver, 83 – jurors were told.

But his lawyer, Peter Griffiths QC, said the case against Chua, a Filipino who had worked at the hospital since 2009, was circumstantial and that he denied all 36 charges “from first to last”, Manchester crown court heard. Griffiths told the jury that the trial judge, Mr Justice Openshaw, had allowed him to take the “quite exceptional” step of addressing the jury before any evidence had been called, to allow him, he said, to point out the real issues in the case. Griffiths said: “My client denies these allegations. I will be using the term ’scapegoat’ later. “Members of the jury, we have no idea who has committed some poisonings and some alterations. Who did is a matter of conjecture. This case against my client is circumstantial. “Effectively what we are saying here is that the defendant, Victorino Chua, he has been plucked out of a huge number of potential people. The prosecution put huge resources investigating what happened at Stepping Hill Hospital: vast number of officers. Could they end up at the end of the day with ‘I don’t know who did it’?
“Somebody, at the end of the day, has to carry the can. The defence say, when you look at it, this man is a scapegoat.” Chua is alleged to have contaminated saline bags and ampoules with insulin using a hypodermic needle in June and July of 2011. These were then left by him to be used by unsuspecting doctors and nurses. For patients it was a random lottery who was treated with the poisoned saline drips, the jury were told. Insulin causes the body’s blood sugar level to drop dangerously low, known as a hypoglycaemic episode, and the prosecution says it led to the deaths of three patients and brain damage in another.In all, 21 patients were poisoned by Chua, it is alleged.

Anonymous said...

(Continued)

But Griffiths said the defence would call evidence from medical experts – “the best we can find in the field” – who will tell the jury that in 15 of those cases they will not be able to reach the legal threshold to convict the defendant: that they will not be sure beyond reasonable doubt that insulin poisoning and not natural causes caused the hypoglycemic episodes.In the remaining six poisoning cases, Griffiths told the jury that, after hearing both prosecution and defence experts, they would probably be able to be sure the hypoglycaemic episodes were caused by insulin poisoning – but that Chua was not the poisoner.
And in the case of the three alleged murders, Griffiths said the defence did not accept that the hypoglycaemic episodes suffered by them were linked to their deaths, and that there were other “sound, compelling reasons” for the loss of life in those cases. After an initial alert over the cases in the summer of 2011, security was increased and six months later Chua is alleged to have changed tack, administering poison by altering the dosages on the prescription charts of seven patients.
Chua accepted alterations were made but he was not responsible, Griffiths said: no-one saw it happen and many others had the opportunity on the “immensely busy” hospital wards concerned.
Griffiths said the prosecution was trying to link the poisonings and the alterations, but suggested there was no link.Chua has pleaded not guilty to 36 charges, including three alleged murders, one count of grievous bodily harm with intent, 23 counts of attempted grievous bodily harm, eight counts of attempting to cause a poison to be administered and one count of administering a poison.Griffiths added: “The defendant denies he was the perpetrator of any of these incidents. He had the misfortune of being on duty in January 2012 when various alterations were found to have been carried out ... so the finger of suspicion goes on to him.
“He gets arrested, he’s literally on bail for a couple of years. Then they decide to charge him and he ends up here.
“When you analyse matters very, very carefully, you will see the prosecution are nowhere near proving that my client is guilty of these charges.”

The trial, expected to last up to four months, continues.http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jan/21/stepping-hill-victorino-chua-scapegoat

Tania Cadogan said...

“Members of the jury, we have no idea who has committed some poisonings and somealterations.


Ooops

Don't you love it when the defence leaks.

The key word here is some.

By implication they know who did the rest of the poisonings and alterations.

They can only know this if they were told and who would tell them?

Their client, the defendant