Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, February 7, 1993 TAG: 9302080270
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: F-2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
CHILD LABOR?
THE FEDERAL government hasn't said anything quite this dumb since it called ketchup a vegetable.The Labor Department has warned schools in Virginia Beach that they're violating child labor laws by letting elementary schoolchildren wipe tables and sweep the cafeteria floor. Letting them, mind you. Not making them.
Oh, the Dickensian horror of it.
Imagine the tykes swiping icky rags across refuse-strewn expanses of tabletops, swinging unwieldy brooms over vast reaches of tiled floors.
Add to the sheer physical demands the psychological stress these tasks might cause. Recall, if you can stomach it, your own childhood memories of peas and carrots squished under tennis shoes and milk slopped onto tables by boys (well, usually it was the boys) measuring the splash factor when tator tots were dropped from 8 inches. Gross.
Not incensed yet? Well, there's more. A Wage and Hour spokeswoman who did not want to be identified (would you?) said that because cafeteria cleanup usually is done by paid custodians, the children could be considered to be doing employee-type work. Are these guardians of our schools worried about child welfare, or preserving jobs?
It was a complaint from a parent, not a displaced custodian, that drew the eyes of the federal watchdog to the performance of these piddling chores. If that parent wants to deny his child the lessons in personal responsibility and good manners that are the point of these tasks, let him request an exemption.
As for us (we who walked two miles through the snow in our bare feet to get to school before dawn), we say the kids should get cracking on those tables and floors. And don't miss any of the peas that have rolled in the corner.
Memo: ***CORRECTION***