Nathan Johns, a fourth-grader at Van Buren Elementary school in Baldwinsville, NY came home earlier this week and told his dad, James, that he was in trouble for wearing a New York Yankees t-shirt at school.
The 9-year-old claims that his teacher, Peter Addabbo, instructed him to go into the bathroom and turn his shirt inside-out. The shirt Johns was wearing that day was blue, and read “New York No. 52” on the front and “Sabathia” for the Yankees’ pitcher C.C. Sabathia, on the back.
Addabbo is a Boston Red Sox fan, according to Nathan, and the classroom is decorated with Red Sox paraphernalia. “Just because my teacher doesn’t like the Yankees I should still have the right to wear a Yankees shirt,” he told the Syracuse newspaper, the Post-Standard.
After complying with his teacher and reversing his shirt, Nathan was teased on the playground at lunchtime by students from fifth-grade classes. He continued to tell the paper, “It was such a horrible day, I don’t ever want anything like to happen again.”
Baldwinsville Schools Superintendent Jeanne Dangle claims that the district is conducting an investigation into the student’s claims, and has told his parents that she will report back to them in a few days.
“I was stunned, absolutely flabbergasted,” Nate’s dad told the Post-Standard. “I couldn’t believe it. He was distraught. The school preaches all about not allowing bullying, and this really felt like he was being bullied.”
What do you think, was the Red Sox supporting teacher in the wrong here? Let the school district know:
Van Buren Elementary School Phone: (315) 638-6121
Principal: Terry Bick
Baldwinsville School District Phone: (315) 638-6043
Superintendent: Jeanne Dangle
Pat Hill, a 72-year-old real estate agent and grandmother from Alexandria, Virginia, has held season tickets to the Washington Redskins’ games since the 1960s. With the recent downturn in the real estate market she was forced to cancel her $5,300-a-year contract for two end zone seats.
Although she tried negotiating with the ticket office to waive the contract for a year or two, they were not willing to budge, and sued Hill for $66,364, the amount of the tickets each year until 2017, plus legal fees and court costs. Hill did not contest the suit, and a judgment was filed against her.
More information, including a list of NFL teams that make a practice NOT to sue their fans, is available in this Washington Post article.
What do you think - should the team have cut Hill a little slack? Let them know:
Last week a programmer discovered a major flaw in Sears’ gift card processing Web site that allowed anyone to verify an unlimited number of gift card account numbers by writing a workaround to Sears.com’s gift card balance checker.
It only took the programmer, Alex Firmani, a few hours to write a script that could extract all valid Sears and K-Mart gift cards account numbers from their database - the same database that stores Visa, MasterCard and other credit card information for purchases made on the site. It is important to note that while Firmani wrote the script to perform this task, he did not actually run it long enough to obtain a substantial amount of valid numbers - only enough to prove that a security risk existed on Sears’ site.
When Firmani alerted Sears to the security issues, the customer service representative brushed him off, and did not see the urgency in the situation. It took several e-mails to Sears management at the VP level before Sears fixed the security hole.
All of the documentation for the security flaw was made available as a PDF, and documented on Firmani’s blog.
Sears does not have the best history when it comes to online privacy and security practices. In 2008, a flaw in their “Manage My Home” Web site allowed access to any customer’s purchase history, both on-line and off-line. And, just a few weeks ago, an exploit on Sears’ Web site allowed users to change the content on the site, to sell - among other things - a baby roaster.
Purchasing anything from Sears.com? Tread carefully, and doublecheck your credit card statements!
When Steve Valdez walked into the Bank of America branch in Tampa Florida to cash a check from his wife this week, he was astounded when bank staffers refused to let him cash the check without a thumbprint. Valdez, you see, was born without arms, and relies on prosthetic limbs - he has no way to provide a thumbprint.
When the teller realized his situation, she talked with her manager, but the manager refused to make an exception for Valdez’s disability, even though the check was written from his wife’s account at that very Bank of America branch.
The bank offered Valdez two choices - either bring in his wife or open an account at the bank. Valdez told the bank manager that those choices were not in keeping with the American with Disabilities Act (ADA) because the ADA states that businesses must comply with nondiscrimination requirements that prohibit exclusion, segregation, and unequal treatment.
What do you think, should Bank of America found a way to let Valdez cash his check? Let them know:
Call Bank of America at 800-432-1000, and say “Talk to an associate” when prompted.
When Jennifer Frederich took her 6-month-old daughter, Kaylin, with her to Burger King earlier this week, she never imagined that the tot’s bare feet would have her kicked out of the restaurant.
Frederich was visiting the Burger King in Sunset Hills, MO, outside of St. Louis. She was standing in line to order her food with her baby, her mother, and her grandmother when the restaurant’s manager looked over and told the group that they would have to take their order “to go”, because the baby’s shoeless feet violated the restaurant’s policy.
Trying to explain to the manager that the baby didn’t even have a pair of shoes yet because she didn’t walk did no good, the manager insisted that shoes needed to be worn, and threatened to call the police. Frederich and her companions quickly finished their meal and left the restaurant. [See video below]
In a comment to the St. Louis FOX TV affiliate, Frederich said, “People have to know about this… if you’re going to go to Burger King get some shoes on your baby or go somewhere else. I think they just need to understand, it’s a baby. They’re not going to be walking around in their dirty, nasty, feet. I feel like the policy was probably for grown adults who might walk in without shoes on. That’s understandable. But, babies don’t wear shoes.”
Think Burger King was off the mark on this? Let them know:
Sunset Hills Burger King phone: (314) 965-2902 Burger King Corporate Customer Service phone: (305) 378-3535 or (305) 378-7200
