I’m an ER nurse and left my phone in my locker during a busy shift, so when the school called me about my daughter I asked if it could wait. They insisted it was urgent: my daughter had hit a boy. When I arrived at the principal’s office I found my daughter, the boy (bleeding from the nose), the principal, a male teacher, and the boy’s mother.
I’d just finished suturing a different child and explained I’d been delayed. The staff described the incident as my daughter assaulting the boy. Then I asked my daughter what happened. She said the boy had been “snapping” her bra in class despite her telling the teacher, and finally he pulled it off—so she punched him.
The administrators minimized it. I asked why staff hadn’t intervened and told the teacher to try being on the receiving end: put someone else’s bra on and see how “fun” it is. The principal tried to focus on my daughter having struck someone, but I pointed out the huge size difference—my daughter is small and he’s much bigger—and asked how many times she was supposed to let him touch her.
I told them I was taking my daughter home, warned that I would press charges for sexual assault if he touched her again, and reported the situation to the school board. The school later moved my daughter to a different class, away from the boy and the teacher involved.