I wrote a letter to Ms. Floyd directly, and this is a copy of my letter to the Editor.
This is in response to Ms. Floyd’s column on Tuesday regarding Jamie Ford’s visit to Highland Park High School. I have been teaching children manners for over 13 years in Dallas, and wrote a weekly column for the DMN Neighborsgo for the 10 plus years that it was part of the newspaper. I am a resident in HP, and my son was at the assembly. There is no excuse for students being rude to any speaker at any time. No one is disputing that. The reason Ms. Floyd was not hearing parents give a straightforward apology is first of all because Mr. Ford’s account of the events are different than the student’s and facility. Also, as a speaker and journalist, I have had some obnoxious students and young children at the talks I give on manners. As much as I would like to vent and tell everyone that they were not well behaved, I think as a professional I should not blog about them, let alone verbally tell anyone what I experienced. Mr. Ford going to social media is another reason why the parents are very defensive about the incident. Hearing someone rip into children in a public forum is not acceptable. I do want to thank Ms. Floyd for giving credit at the end of her column to the Superintendent and School Board for their apology. If anyone is interested in what happened, I have written about it at http://36w.87c.myftpupload.com/?p=319. Thank you. Elise McVeigh