Lack of discipline and excessive behavioral problems exhibited by students in the classroom are frequently discussed topics these days. There are many theories on what is causing the issue—soft parenting and lax rules enforcement in schools, social disruptions created by the pandemic, an absence of corporal punishment, the absence of God, broken homes—and just as many theories on how to fix the problem. Back in the Dark Ages when I was still in high school, I once watched a gym teacher bounce a basketball off the head of a kid who wasn’t paying attention after he had repeatedly told the kid to quit talking.
Harsh? Maybe. But it went off the back of his head, not his face, and it definitely got the kid’s attention. The kid quit talking and listened to Mr. Radovich, the rest of us got a good laugh, and the class moved on. No harm, no foul. Would such a response by the teacher be accepted today? Probably not.
Teachers today grapple with how to maintain a disciplined environment, most of them hamstrung by overly lenient policies enforced by school boards out of fear of lawsuits and bad press. Might be why a large number of teachers have left the job to find other careers in recent years.
But one Louisiana teacher still toiling away at educating America’s youth took his efforts to enforce order in his class to extremes. It’s still not clear if Robert Mitcham, 70, thought he was being effective in his unusual attempt at getting his students’ attention or whether he was having a true “Falling Down” moment. According to the New York Post, Mitcham “threatened to shoot his third-grade class, warning students that some ‘would not survive’” and that there were “too many of y’all to get rid of,” because he “only had six bullets in his gun.” Terrified students, parents and administrators all agree the teacher took it, well, a lot too far. So did police.
Mitcham, a gym teacher at Downsville Community Charter School, was arrested and charged with terrorizing after a parent reported the incident to the Union Parish Sheriff’s Office. According to the sheriff’s office, Mitcham allegedly told his third-grade students that he “had bullets for his gun and would bring it to the school and shoot,” sending waves of fear through the classroom.
The parent who reported the incident told authorities that their child, along with others in the class, was terrified. Mitcham later explained to investigators that he felt overwhelmed and was simply trying to get the students to settle down, insisting that he never meant to threaten them.
Two days after the incident, Mitcham was arrested and held on a $15,000 bond. He was barred from returning to the school while the case remains pending. According to KJCT News 8, Mitcham was remorseful and apologized to the students after an older student reported the situation to another teacher.
Union Parish Sheriff Dusty Gates emphasized the importance of vigilance in school safety, reminding parents, “If you see something, say something.” Gates encouraged parents and students to communicate with school resource officers about any concerns, particularly those related to potential violence.
The principal of Downsville Community Charter School, Tony Cain, refrained from discussing the incident in detail but refuted the claims made by the reporting parent. He said the first-hand accounts from students who witnessed the event did not fully align with the allegations circulating on social media. Cain reassured the public that the school is confident in the accuracy of the students’ accounts.
Mitcham’s future, both as an educator and a free man, remains uncertain as the investigation continues. As the debate over school discipline and teachers’ struggles to manage increasingly chaotic classrooms grows, this incident raises hard questions about where the line should be drawn. As isolated an incident as this is, it, unfortunately, also lends some ammo to those opposed to recent moves in some states to allow teachers to carry concealed firearms in the class in order to help deter school shootings.
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