From first crushes to moral dilemmas and social hierarchies to embarrassing moments, middle school has enough fodder for seasons worth of TV shows. Some networks have hit gold capitalizing on the situations to which everyone can relate! As your tween heads back to school, check out some of my favorites.
The last thing a guy wants is to get slammed in his locker! Girls like to glam up their school issued spaces, but boys also benefit from being organized. Help your son personalize his locker with these practical finds.
It's a middle school milestone! All kids want their own locker — a place to store their stuff when they are at school — and tween girls like to put a personal touch on the metal closet to make it extra cool. We've rounded up some fab and affordable items.
The middle-school version of ourselves probably had a blurry idea of the adults we would become, but some kids are proving that we knew a lot more about our identities than we thought. With no doubt about who they are attracted to, more and more kids are coming out as gay or bisexual before they make it to high school.
An article in this weekend's New York Times Magazine examines the trend and reveals that many of these kid are coming out before they've ever dated or kissed anyone of either sex. They just know they don't want to date the opposite sex.
The piece profiles Austin, a gay 13-year-old from Oklahoma. To hear what Austin thinks about tweens and teens coming out and the reactions they get, read more
A substitute math teacher in Connecticut didn't put two and two together. Under her supervision in math class, two eighth grade students at Pulaski Middle School in New Britain engaged in an oral sex act. As classmates watched, one supposedly taped the act on a camera phone. The footage is now rumored to be on YouTube. While the students' conduct was wildly inappropriate, the teacher must have had blinders on. Who do you think is to blame?
Last week, The New York Times broke a story out of Maine in which the Portland school board approved a measure allowing middle-schoolers to gain access to prescription birth control medications without notifying their parents.
With this new ruling, King Middle School not only provides the birth control medications for their students, but their medical clinic also offers immunizations and physical checkups in addition to counseling for sexually transmitted diseases.
While some parents viewed this measure as a violation of parental rights, others felt that it was a necessary precaution to offer protection for kids that were engaging in "risky behavior."
I am sure this article will strike a cord with all you mothers out there, so how would you feel if your child were offered prescription birth control without your consent? And you non-mothers, do you think it's a good idea or a bad idea for middle schoolers to be exposed to birth control at such a young age?
We have all heard about random drug testing in our respective places of employment and in professional sports, but what about in public schools?
The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy recently announced that it would be holding four regional summits promoting random student drug testing in public middle and high schools. The program, which has actually already been implemented in almost 1,000 schools across the country, requires that kids submit to random drug testing if they would like to participate in sports and other extracurricular activities. The tests would be looking for cocaine, marijuana, ecstasy, opium-based substances, oxycontin and steroids.
Do you guys think random drug testing in our schools is a good idea?
