Boy turns in knife he accidently brought to school and may be expelled

[ECH1969]

A Far-Eastside couple say they are stunned that a Warren Township Schools principal suspended their son and recommended his expulsion for possession of a pocketknife even though he turned the knife in to the office as soon as he arrived at school.

After turning in the knife, the eighth-grader was suspended from Stonybrook Middle School for 10 days and may be expelled.
Elizabeth Voge-Wehrheim and Frank Wehrheim, the boy's mother and stepfather, have hired Indianapolis attorney Lawrence T. Newman to represent them.

He said he handed the knife to Teri Donahue, the school's treasurer, and told her he had brought it to school by mistake.

As a result of Elliot's actions, the school's principal, Jimmy Meadows, suspended Elliot for the maximum 10 school days as allowed by law and recommended Elliot be expelled. A confidential expulsion hearing is scheduled for April 10.

http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060403/NEWS01/604030389/1002/OPINION

[BattyDem]

1. Get punished for being honest and doing the right thing ...

which is exactly how BushCo does things. I guess it's the new Amerikan way! :eyes:

[FloridaPat]

11. The New Amerika - honesty = punishment, lies = promotions

[peace frog]

23. Yep, and it starts at the top

One need look no further than BushCo to test the reality of your statement.

[Gormy Cuss]

2. Zero tolerance policies are often misunderstood.

They mean zero tolerance for brains and common sense in the application of the policy.

[seabeyond]

8. that is exactly right. the lazy way out. not take individual events

listen and think. no creative problem solving. just get em all..... implement punishment as a whole, regardless of the sense it makes. i talked to school counselor about son. he came home with fingernail marks on neck. i wanted her to have a heads up, in case he ever reacted, this wasn't a first. she wanted name of kid. son wants to handle. i say no way, knowing what is in store for kid and honoring sons desire to resolve. yet, i told the woman, if you think i am going to tell son to take shit cause of no tolerance, you are wrong. and that is wrong.

yes..... not only with kids. we are seeing no tolerance across board. i am just not perfect enough for this no tolerance world. i hope these parents can be successful in some way helping schools to see the errors of their way

[saltpoint]

21. Gormy Cuss and Seabeyond and others here in this thread

have absolutely NAILED it.

I want you people as my neighbors. Now. That assault on the zero tolerance policies rings very true to my ears.

Thanx.

[enfield collector]

39. zero tollerance= zero common sense.

[wtmusic]

3. effin' great

kid makes a mistake, realizes it, comes clean, and gets his ass kicked.

Message to other kids: keep it hidden, don't tell, lie like a rug. Principal "Jimmy Meadows" must be Republican.

[MadHound]

4. This is just so wrong on a couple of counts

One, you're punishing a kid who made an honest mistake, and immediately brought it to the attention of the proper authorities. He did the right thing, within the current rules, and is still being punished.

Secondly, what has this country come to when somebody in middle, junior or senior high school can't carry a pocketknife? I carried one to school, and regularly used it, just like many other people of my generation, and this was only a quarter century ago. Yes, we had fights and gang throw downs, but knives weren't used, because who in their right mind would use a pocket knife.

Have things become that bad in our schools that useful tools get confiscated like this. Sad, just sad.

[Yupster]

15. We all had them every day too

Once we earned our cub scout tote badges anyway.

Amazing how much life has changed since when I was a kid.

[proud2BlibKansan]

28. I didn't think it was that bad until

I saw a first grader stab another first grader in the leg with a pencil - over nothing. The victim was taken out on a stretcher and had emergency surgery to remove the pencil and the lead from her leg.

The next day the parents of the kid who did the stabbing were in the office screaming "It's unfair, he's only 7!"

The parents of the victim pressed assault charges. I suppose that seemed unfair to the stabber's parents as well.

So yeah, if they can be this violent in 1st grade, and with just a pencil, I definitely don't want any of them toting knives to school.

[Iblis]

34. My question is...

Is it the pencil that did wrong, or the child?

Why would a child stab someone else with a pencil "over nothing"?

You stood by and watched someone stab another person?

I agree with the previous posters; kids that age used to carry pocket knives and some even rifles to school with no major incidents occuring. Did the weapons change, or did the children?

Just wondering.

L

[proud2BlibKansan]

46. There were 25 kids in the class

One kid stabbed another in the leg with a pencil. I was in the room but not close enough to stop the stabbing.

I have no idea why the kid stabbed his classmate. He was suspended and transferred to another school so I never got to ask him why he stabbed the girl sitting next to him. He seemed like a nice little boy who just snapped one day and stabbed the closest person.

Yes, I do think kids are more violent these days. I believe most teachers would agree with that.

I am not going to dignify your dumb question about whether the pencil or the child did wrong with an answer.

[Iblis]

48. You do know what a rhetorical question is? Right?

Don't answer that.

I guess I still have to ask: If you believe that children are "more violent nowadays", how did they get more violent?

Bottom line: People should be looking for answers to these questions rather than expelling kids for plastic guns and Swiss Army knives.

L
EDIT: On further reflection, I'm hoping that the statement reading "Bottom line", won't be lost in the somewhat argumentative tone of my first post.
Thank You.

[proud2BlibKansan]

52. I think it is violence in the media

But a lot of DUers don't like to hear that. We saw a lot of kid on kid violence (body slams, etc) about 10 years ago during the wrestling (Steve Austin) realm of popularity but that has died down. Now we are seeing more weapons and hearing more threats. They have to hear it somewhere and then bring it to school. Kids don't just pull violent thoughts and actions out of the air.

Of course we try to deal with it but there is only so much we can do to combat societal influences. My school has lots of intervention programs for kids who bully and appear violent. We have a social worker, a full time counselor and a part time counselor who all work every day to teach kids how to handle anger and how to treat each other with respect. That is unusual; most elementary schools have only one counselor who isn't always full time. We are usually able to calm kids down at school but many still get in trouble in the community. One of our kindergarteners last week was picked up by the police for threatening a neighborhood kid with a knife.

I do know that if this situation had played out the way the article says at my school, the kid wouldn't be looking at possible expulsion. If he really had never been in trouble before, he probably wouldn't have been suspended either.

But we never get all the information in these cases. I have seen far too many in my own district where the story the parent takes to the media is not what really happened. And schools are bound by privacy laws so we can't give you the details Mom left out.

So I have learned to not believe the story in the paper or on the 6:00 news. I know from experience it is not always the WHOLE story. And I hate to see people who don't work in schools jump all over these stories and assume we are over-disciplining kids.

In this day and age it just seems popular to bash schools and teachers and these kinds of stories just don't help. So I wish smart DUers would look at them with a slightly more critical eye.

[Iblis]

57. ahhh "The Media is to blame."

Everytime I hear this, all I can think about is, "What was TV like when I was a kid?"

A lot of Western/"Cowboy" shows and WWII/"Army" shows.

"Rat Patrol"
"Gunsmoke" (The opening actually showed someone being gunned down!!!11)
"Roy Rogers"
"Combat"

All of them featuring guns and some type of violence in EVERY episode.

That doesn't even include the movies I watched in the afternoon or on the weekends...

Or the news which put much more violent images of war than we can see now. And crime.

On another note, you don't believe that a school would just expel somebody on a first offense?
Would you like me to google "zero tolerance weapon schools erroneous"? I will.

L

[proud2BlibKansan]

64. Ah but that media was not near as realistic as what kids

see today. We also did not have video games. And we played outside a bit more than kids do today. We were much more active physically and ran off a lot of extra energy. We had 3 recesses a day when I was in elem school. Our kids now are lucky to get one.

No I don't think a school would expel a kid on a first offense, but it really depends on the offense. In my state, there is a law that says kids who bring guns to school automatically get a one year suspension. So if you bring a gun and it is your first offense, you WILL get suspended for a year. Knives are dependant on the length. A long knife will definitely get you sent home for a long time but most pocket knives, as this kid had, are not that long. I believe they range from 3 days to a semester, depending on prior offenses.

[Iblis]

71. Again. Did the kids change or did we change or did the world change?

I guess I'm still left asking, "Who's responsiblity is it?" Are parents keeping their children locked in their homes, playing video games and systems that the children bought with their own money?

I guess people will ultimately decide if they want their children raised by parents or by the State.

*pondering*

Back to work,

L

[proud2BlibKansan]

73. All of the above

And I believe it is all of our responsibility. Parents and schools must work together to help children grow and thrive.

[Iblis]

77. At the risk of sounding snarky,

based on your other responses here and your journal, I can already see that we will have to agree to disagree.

thank you,

L

[proud2BlibKansan]

86. Well as a true blue liberal,

I believe we all have a responsibility to the kids in our communities. It takes a village. Parents need to be supportive of schools and schools must be reasonable about rules and expectations. I also think businesses in a community can play a big part in helping to educate our kids.

[Yupster]

95. I think one possible difference is

that there is so a much greater percentage of kids growing up without a dad in the home today.

I think dads may have been important on setting limits of acceptable and unacceptable rough play.

[proud2BlibKansan]

100. A lot of kids go home to an empty house.

Mom works nights or evenings and the kids are home alone.

And even in two parent families, usually both parents work. They are swamped with just surviving and don't have the time to spend with their kids that our parents had.

[Hippo_Tron]

87. Yea, what's the deal with recess these days

I'm 18 so I wasn't in elementary school that long ago but I can tell you that we didn't get three recesses. We got 2 in grades (K-2) and 2 in grades (3-5). I guess we supplemented it with PE twice a week in the K-2 and three times a week in grades 3-5. I think pretty much my only memorable moments from elementary school were on the playground. It seems like lately people seem to think that it's a bad thing to let kids go out and play.

[proud2BlibKansan]

90. It is the whole focus on testing and academics

We have less and less time for recess. The pressure is on to get these kids to score well on those tests.

I just heard today that the schools in my district who had bad test scores last year are being made to test kindergarteners. Can you imagine? 5 and 6 year olds filling in bubbles on a standardized test!! You can bet those kids had less recess this year.

[Hippo_Tron]

92. Agreed, fully funded or not laws like NCLB are horrid

Standardized testing has just become ridiculous.

[AnneD]

104. People that do away with recess to devote more time to study

have some severe misconceptions as to how children learn. Play is not idle time-they are learning social skills among other things. Children learn through play (more so in some kids than others). To ask kids to sit in desks and work quietly is just plain unrealistic. They approach learning with energy and excitement. Any teacher will tell you that kids focus better on subjects after recess when some of this energy has been vented.

[AnneD]

94. I deal with elementary kids every day....

Many of us in this school have done a lot of soul searching this year. This has been the worst year with kids in my 12 yrs. My Principal has had almost 40 yrs, and she is saying the same thing. We had to suspend several kinder and prek's this year. It was not because we wanted to, but these kids were so disruptive as to interfer with other children learning. These kids ended up in intense counseling.

The kids are not worse, they reflect our society. Now I don't know about the media-that may be a chicken or egg argument. We try to help these kids, but some don't have a chance. They need a new life and they won't get it. There are some we have lost by the 3 grade (and you can tell too). I see it at all grade levels. I call these kids the disposables, because that is how their families, the schools, and society treat them.

Think I am harsh. Show me what you spend money on and I'll show you your priority (your treasure is where your heart is). How much do we spend for education -for quality teachers and facilities? How much for health care for kids? OK, since we don't spend for health care for kids, how much do schools spend to have a Nurse in the kids school (so maybe she can catch problems before the get out of hand). Here is a clue, there is one school Nurse for ever 2000 kids in public schools in the US on average. How about a social worker or counselor. They are even more rare than Nurses (in fact Nurses usually do THAT job too). In some states, more money is spent on incarceration than education. Show me your treasure.

We have no drugs, no weapons policy in our school. We have caught parents sending kids to school with drugs but we have been sensible and talk to the parents (kids seem to bring weapons on their own). This principal is obviously a jerk if the kid self reported and I hope the parents take it to the Board. The kid does not need that on his record (and that can hinder further education).

I can tell you this, everyone in education is on their last nerve. I truly feel sorry for the new teachers coming in and I think I may be 1-2 years before I leave School Nursing for the private sector. It is really going to be bad in the near future. The Boomer teachers will be going out soon so we will be headed into interesting times. I just prey that parents fight to keep business (vouchers) out, otherwise we really are doomed.

[proud2BlibKansan]

97. I am a boomer teacher

and I look more and more forward to retiring.

Yes, this has been the worst year ever.

[AngryAmish]

60. I almost got kicked out of first grade

Kid stole my ball. So I bit him. Bit him hard enough to draw blood.

I got in trouble and there was some talk of expelling me. I got to stay.

I don't think kids are more violent. We just forget how bad we were. People freak out just because kids have a rock fight. Rock fights were fun.

[Iblis]

62. Wasn't it Heinlein who said...

"There are no dangerous weapons; there are only dangerous men."

?

Of course now they would send you away and or medicate you.

L

[proud2BlibKansan]

66. I have been teaching for almost 30 years

and kids really are more violent today than when I first started.

The stuff my sisters and I did as kids is tame compared to what kids do today.

[Orrex]

56. Hey, welcome to DU!

:hi:

[Iblis]

58. Thanks. I hope it lasts.

Already, my first day and I'm in a debate with one of the top posters.

I guess I'm making a splash my first day!

:hide: I really don't like to make trouble. Much.

Thank you again!

L

[Orrex]

59. "Top Poster" just means they've posted a lot. Don't let it phase you!

Pretty much everyone here likes a rousing debate, as long as it's reasonably civil...

[anarch]

50. for the love of God, we must keep these pencils out of our schools

What I always wondered about were those damn compasses, with the stubby pencil on one side and the really sharp pointy metal bit on the other. I wouldn't give one of those things to a kid.

[Iblis]

53. I really want to comment, but...

This statement, on this forum, with all of the symbology around it just keeps making me smile. I am left speechless.

Hail Eris!

L

[proud2BlibKansan]

54. I have compasses that don't have a sharp point

They are all plastic and have a stub end. They are more expensive than the metal kind with the point but I wouldn't give those to kids EVER.

And you know what, kids can turn almost anything in to a weapon. Paper clips are kept out of kid range in my room. They make pretty scary looking stabbing devices when twisted straight. I can also tell a story about a kid suspended for threatening to stab classmates with a paper clip. If his mom had gone to the media, the headline would have read: 'Kid suspended for having paper clip at school'. :eyes:

[AnneD]

106. As a School Nurse I can tell you....

a kid can and will get hurt with anything. To think you can childproof everything is stupid (remember the toddler recently that crawled into a claw game machine). Instead of keeping things from them, teach them to use things responsibly. Of course there will be some accidents but we learn from those too. Hopefully the accidents are not too serious.

By the way this is a pet peeve of mine....Pencils are made of(and have been made since the turn of the last century) graphite and are relatively harmless. I am sick and tired of everyone panicing and going ape shit when a little piece of graphite stains the wound or breaks off. If the pencils were made lead-the wounds would be much worse.

Little kids under the second grade should be using those fat pencils and kinder and under really shouldn't be using anything but those flat crayons (due to muscle immaturity)and shouldn't be doing too fine a motor work. They aren't always ready for it.

[aden_nak]

5. Okay, so help me out here, Principal Meadows. . .

The correct thing for Elliot to do would have been:

1) Hide the knife, and thus bring it into the classroom.
2) Discard the knife, thus leaving a weapon unattended on school grounds.
3) Skip school that day in order to not bring the knife into the classroom.

I'm just curious which of those options would have been the better choice.

Idiot.

[proud2BlibKansan]

14. Leave it in his pocket

and don't tell anyone he had it.

That's what a smart kid would have done.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

68. Exactly what my 15 year old did. Now he's expelled for 6 weeks

He knew he wasn't supposed to have it. Woke up late for the bus, threw on jeans from the day before, found it in his pocket on the bus. When he found it, he shouldn't have pulled it out of his pocket, another kid saw him and turned him in. :eyes:

and yes, I bought it for him when he was 12. that's when I got my first pocketknife, and I carried it all the time. They're incredibly handy for all kinds of things.

[proud2BlibKansan]

69. That's a drag

I don't mean to pry but had he been suspended before or was this his first offense? Is it standard policy to suspend kids for 6 weeks who bring pocket knives to school?

[Viva_La_Revolution]

76. He had a little trouble several years ago (grade school)

When his dad got remarried, but since then has been a great kid. Teacher didn't want him expelled, Vice Principal didn't want him expelled, School Counselor didn't want him expelled. But they had to follow the zero tolerance rule. So yes, his disruptive behavior back in grade school worked against him. Didn't matter that he had cleaned up his act for years and was doing excellently behavior wise and grade wise. Okay, actually it did, because they are letting him come back to the same school. Teacher said they usually suspend and then send them off to different school instead of letting them come back. Because that's what the law says.

He felt terrible for the first few weeks, thought everyone was seeing him as that bad kid again. He started to come out of that when he heard all the good reports in his favor during the hearing.

[proud2BlibKansan]

84. They look that far back??

I am almost sure we don't do that in my district. But I could be wrong.

Sounds like he is going to be okay. What a bad experience though. I am also glad to hear that a hearing (for once!) was a good thing for a kid.

[Orrex]

6. Let's be reasonable

If they'd found the knife during an Alito-approved strip-search, he'd have been expelled anyway.

The kid should consider himself lucky for not having a Supreme Court Justice tell him to drop trou.

[saltpoint]

16. I live nextdoor to the Alitos, Orrex, and from across the lawn, I hear

Mrs. Alito's plaintiff voice, wailing and crying at the comment you just made!

When doing the noble work of disparaging rightwing nutcases, please use your indoor voice. You know how VOLATILE she is!

[Ezlivin]

18. Seriously, do we KNOW he's not involved with a local al qaeda cell?

Have his parents been properly wiretapped?

Are their papers all in order?

Do they owe any back taxes?

Are they members of a registered mainstream church?

:sarcasm:

[saltpoint]

24. : )

[proud2BlibKansan]

7. Ah another N E I

Not
Enough
Information

What was his prior discipline record? - That's a good place to start.

I know I know - His mom says he is a model kid. But kids whose parents think they are perfect get suspended all the time. Really.

[eyesroll]

37. Actually, the only time in the article where the word "model" was used

to describe the boy, it was by the principal:

Meadows noted in his summary that "throughout the entire investigation and student due-process, Elliott (sic) was a model student."

[saltpoint]

9. Torture along with long-term no-appeal detainment at Gitmo

is my recommendation.

When it comes to terrorists, mercy is not a virtue.

____

(Yes, I'm kidding.)

[mdmc]

10. something like this just happened in NY

very sad.

[Name removed]

12. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[proud2BlibKansan]

22. So based on what the parent and her lawyer are saying,

you are going to call and harrass this principal??

First of all, you won't get the principal, you will get the office staff and the last thing they are going to do when you call and tell them the principal is a douche bag is put you through to him. No, they will probably pick up another phone and report you. And yes, all schools have not only caller ID but recording devices on their phones.

Secondly, you don't have all the facts. You have Mom's version of events. We have no way of knowing if it is accurate.

[Richard Steele]

29. Wrong site, pal- we don't do the 'stalking & harrassing' thing here.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

70. It's not the Principals fault, it's federal law. nt

[proud2BlibKansan]

75. Really?

I know there are federal laws about guns in schools, but I didn't realize they applied to knives too.

I have also heard from a couple attorneys that the federal statute is weak so that is why many states (like mine) have state laws banning guns and weapons in schools.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

79. oops, I looked it up. It's a blanket policy for the school district

modeled on the Fed law.

Everything from hugging to scope mouthwash in some of the zero commonsense laws

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&safe=off&q=zero+tolerance+schools+oregon

Oh look. PICTURES of weapons too

The problem began when the Marine's sister brought the picture to McKay High School to post on a classroom bulletin board.

The assignment was to show McKay graduates at work.

However, the principal of the school, Cynthia Richardson, would not allow the picture to go up because of the school's zero tolerance policy on weapons.
http://www.katu.com/stories/76079.html

[Iblis]

82. So much for "Supporting our troops"... (n/t)

NT

[proud2BlibKansan]

88. Oh good heavens, a picture??

That is absolutely ridiculous.

[BlooInBloo]

13. Wonder if the kid was rich/poor, black/white?

[Fridays Child]

17. Message to the student body: Honesty and doing the right thing...

...will get you nothing but trouble. I hope those students stage a walkout over this.

[proud2BlibKansan]

25. No this is the message:

If you get into trouble and you don't think it's fair, hire a lawyer and go to the media. Let the court of public opinion judge you.

[seabeyond]

41. i am almost always on the school side. and i have to remember

to hear the full story, because what we get first hand is often not the whole story. that being said, no toleranc bothers me, a lot. i have never been a fan of no tolerance. i think it is a lazy way of resolving issue and dealing with the problems and crisis's in schools. further i am seeing a world of no tolerance. jsut listen to the words no tolerance. what does no tolerance say to you. because i have got to tell you proud, i am just not good enough for no tolerance

my oldest son, 11, so easy, so good. he is a bad kid in his school. this is a kid that wants to follow rules, he wants to be a good kid. works hard at it. he wants to please the teachers and principles. but..... in this new school that is hard ass, and NO TOLERANCE, that i love so much..... he just cannot be good enough. they have a seperation evey 6 weeks of the "good" kids and the "bad" kids. he has made good kid list once. bad kid twice

we laugh and laugh, that my little edmund is a bad kid. all that know him think i jest. no i say, this school, he is a bad kid

he is brilliant. he is like a little einstein. so obtuse........ hence a bad kid

again i support and like this school becasue academics is priority and he can be smart without being picked on. but man...... we cannot be good enough for no tolerance. it leaves no roo for mistakes

so no,.... ia m not a fan

and i see it as what we demand of all cictizens across the nation. a damn hard way to live

[proud2BlibKansan]

55. I think zero tolerance is a bad idea too

But then again, I don't work in a high school with a couple thousand kids where there aren't enough adults on staff to supervise them as closely as they should be supervised. Zero tolerance is almost a necessity at some schools.

Your kid sounds like he has a pretty wise parent. :)

[seabeyond]

80. man

i really should have edited that post, wink

i know it is a tough world right now for all involved. be it the teens, teacher and certainly the public schools in general being raked over the coals.

i would think the best way of dealing with this would be for all parties to sit down, reason, and realize the absurdity in this. it has always worked for me dealing with school.

[Hippo_Tron]

89. Zero tolerance exists to make politicians look good

It has basically the same deterrent effects that mandatory minimums have for drug users and that the death penalty has for murderers.

[Yupster]

96. Zero tolerance exists

so the schools can cover their asses when lawsuits come up.

They have to be consistent or they get creamed in court so the way to be consistent is zero tolerance.

It's stupid but in our world of litigation and court dates, it's what schools decide to do.

[proud2BlibKansan]

101. State laws mandate zero tolerancce

And they were passed in the 90s as a reaction to violence in schools. Schools haven't decided to enforce zero tolerance; they have no choice.

So I don't think it has anything to do with lawsuits.

[Fridays Child]

42. I respectfully disagree.

If the facts of this article are accurate, the young man and his family have every right to pursue this in court and in the media. This brand of stupidity among those charged with teaching our children should be be exposed.

[proud2BlibKansan]

61. IF the facts are accurate

I can tell you from experience, nine times out of ten, Mom is not giving her attorney or the media the whole story.

There was a case here last year where a kid got suspended for finding a gun and turning it in when he got to school. That's the way his mom and her attorney told the story on the 6:00 news. He was on his way to school, found this gun, picked it up and turned it in to the principal when he got to school.

Well I know that principal and here is what REALLY happened: He found the gun before he got on the bus, (he later admitted he didn't know if it was real or not), put it in his backpack and got on the bus. On the bus, he pointed it at several kids and threatened to "blow their heads off". The kids told the bus driver, she stopped the bus and asked for the kid to give her the gun. He refused. So the bus driver called the school and the principal drove to meet the bus, got on and told the kid to give her the gun. She took him off of the bus, put him in her car and drove him home. So he NEVER even got to school. She told his mom he was suspended for at least that day for threatening the other kids with the gun. The buses here have cameras so she also promised to send Mom a copy of the tape.

Mom called the media and at 6:00 we were told the kid had been suspended for finding a gun and turning it in when he got to school.

The real story should have been that a kid threatened to shoot other kids on a bus with a gun he had found and DID NOT KNOW IF IT WAS REAL OR NOT. Instead, that principal was deluged with calls for days from angry parents and other concerned citizens because she had suspended a kid who tried to do the right thing.

See how these stories get twisted? I could tell a dozen more.

[Iblis]

65. Google has 178,000 results for "kid school erroneous zero tolerance"

n/t

[proud2BlibKansan]

67. Your point is?

Sorry I am not following you here.

[Iblis]

74. Ultimately, people are going to take the easy way out.

Why would a "harried" school official with "too many students" take the time to figure out what a individual situation involves, when given the option-by Federal Law-to just get rid of the problem by suspending/expelling the child?

I am countering your "dozen stories" by saying that there are thousands of stories involving abuse of power regarding this issue.

Once again: essential freedom v. temporary safety.

L
PS Sorry I was so obtuse.

[proud2BlibKansan]

83. Well it is his J O B to look at those individual situations

I am not saying all principals will do this, but ideally, they should. My principal absolutely refuses to send kids home unless she has to. She keeps them at school and disciplines them there. However, in the event of certain kinds of weapons and threats, she doesn't have a lot of choice. Some form of out of school suspension is mandatory under state law.

My dozens of stories are incidents I have personal knowledge of. I know I could google and find thousands but I usually just talk about incidents I know about personally.

You weren't that obtuse. Please accept my belated welcome to DU. :hi:

[AnneD]

107. Common sense has not left our school yet....

our principal does one one one and will do an in school suspension in her office before she expells a kid. It would have to be a major offense. We even had a kid come in from another district that had broken his teachers arm (elementary). We had a hard time keeping him in, but we made through the year (2 yrs ago). But this year HAS been the worst, and the kids in trouble have been younger.

PROUD2BELIB, have you noticed that all your questions about a kid are answered at your first open house:evilgrin:

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

19. Some people do not punish to keep order or dissuade bad behavior.

They do it to satisfy their sick, perverted S&M fetishes*.

* Disclaimer: I know there are healthy S&M fetishes which are neither sick nor perverted. Punishism isn't one of them, though.

[madaboutharry]

20. Jimmy Meadows

is a horse's ass. I hope the community gets behind this kid and this clown Meadows comes out looking like the jerk he must be.

[Roland99]

105. How about we barrage the school with letters, emails and calls?

Show our support of the honest young lad and our disdain for bureaucratic asshats.

[Betsy Ross]

26. THe boy should have left the school grounds,

lit up a joint and slashed some tires with his knife. :sarcasm:

[seabeyond]

31. lol lol actually have done something wrong. isnt it funny as a parent

i would be patting son on back telling him how responsible he was deciding to take to office. that i was proud he had thought it out. my obtuse forgetful child, i would have been so proud if he realized he had the knife and problem solved going to an adult.

shame on this school

[etherealtruth]

32. He would have been in less trouble

:banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead:

[Fridays Child]

27. Tell the principal what you think. Here's the school's contact page...

http://stonybrook.warren.k12.in.us/home/contact.asp

And here's the principal's email address: [e-mail]

[longship]

30. Explusion *must* be reviewed.

Nobody can be expelled on one person's say-so. One hopes that honesty and doing the right thing should be taken into account here.

As a former teacher in an at-risk high school, I fully support no tolerance policies. The student was undboubtedly aware of these policies. The suspension of the student is automatic, and should be. However, if I were involved in the case I might not support expulsion. It depends on the particulars. Has the student had prior problems? Etc.

If the situation is how it has been stated, I would *not* support expulsion.

[Dhalgren]

35. Just curious... What difference would it make if the kid had

"priors"? Even if the kid was a repeat offender, if he mistakenly brought a knife to school, discovered his mistake, went immediately to the office and voluntarily turned in the knife - he did the right thing. He could have lied and said that he "found" the knife; but they probably would have suspended him anyway, because the knife was in his possession between finding it and turning it in...

[longship]

38. It would make every difference.

School violence policies are not capricious. They are geared toward resolving one of the more severe problems in our schools. In the high school in which I taught mathematics assaults on teachers was not an uncommon occurence. Theft was rampant; teachers had to secure everything. These policies are in place for a very, very good reason. The safety of the students and teachers in paramount.

I fully support these kind of actions. If you have not been in a high school recently, you might not understand. If you haven't been in an at-risk high school you certainly won't know the extent to which violence is a very real problem in spite of the no tolerance policies.

The circumstances should be taken into consideration, but so must prior behavior.

Carrying a weapon into school is a crime. It should be treated as such.

[High Plains]

43. A fine example of the zero tolerance mentality at work

"Carrying a weapon into school is a crime. It should be treated as such."

Okay, the kid realizes he mistakenly brought the pocket knife to school. He turns it in. He is then punished for doing the right thing. Automatic suspension? That's the goddamned problem. Don't these school administrators have working brains?

[BlooInBloo]

45. The kid thought safety was paramount too.

That's why he turned it in.

Why is it that zero-tolerance proponents are utterly incapable of admitting even so much as the POSSIBILITY of a mistake in a particular case?

That failing weakens their case - rather than putting on a face of "yah, that's not quite what's intended, let's work to tailor the rule a little bit", it looks instead like what's been described upthread: a lazy idiotic set-it-and-forget-it rule.

Oh well - I'm not a proponent of zero-thinking-tolerance, so they're welcome to make their position as stupid-sounding as they like.

[seabeyond]

47. because

"Why is it that zero-tolerance proponents are utterly incapable of admitting even so much as the POSSIBILITY of a mistake "

ZERO TOLERANCE is why they cannot admit mistake....... bah hahahahaha. that is so funny. you are so funny. it is all so fuckin funny if not so frustrating. the reason they are incapable of admitting mistake is because they support zero tolerance. error is not a factor that matters with zero tolerance. hence my whole issue with zero tolerance. it ignores ALL mistakes. and that, i just cannot condone

[BlooInBloo]

49. I meant a mistake in the end effect of the 0-tol rule...

... but yah to what you said too!

lol

It's one of those things that would be funny if it were happening to someone else...

I can picture the rest of the world taking a timeout from their own problems to laugh at us.

Imagine the school now - the responsible mistake-admitting kid has been kicked out, and the kid who snuck the weapon in is still there. Way to go zero-tolerance!

[Viva_La_Revolution]

72. Yea. It took 2 weeks to get my son reviewed

even if they had decided on no expulsion, that's still 2 weeks of missed schoolwork.
Now he has a tutor, and goes back in another month.

[zbdent]

33. This is one of those cases of

"zero tolerance" backfiring . . .

[Fridays Child]

36. My email to the principal...

You must be out of your mind to have suspended Elliot Voge. He was honest regarding his knife and he took appropriate steps to mitigate the situation. Further, the idea that he might be expelled over the incident simply defies all common sense.

Do you realize what sort of message you're sending to the rest of the student body? You might as well turn on the PA system and announce that honesty and good behavior will be met with punishment.

I can only hope that your career as an adult in charge of children is soon over. Shame.

[bunkerbuster1]

40. a friggin' Swiss Army Knife? Which he turned in immediately?

What is this school thinking?

dumb question, obviously they're not thinking at all.

[Fleshdancer]

44. is THAT the lesson they want to teach this kid?

do the right thing and get punished for it? :wtf: I hope his parents take this to the school board. This is absolutely ridiculous.

[Odin2005]

51. Colombine has made us turn our schools into prisons.

People are such fucking scaredy-cats it's pathetic. Pretty soon students will have to ask permission to breathe. As another poster said; Zero-tolerance = Zero common sense.

[sendero]

63. No good deed..

.... goes unpunished.

[happyslug]

78. A good Fifth Amendment Issue

The Right NOT to incriminate oneself is in the FIRTH AMENDMENT. Thus this Child HAD NO DUTY TO TELL THE SCHOOL HE HAD A KNIFE Because to do so would be to incriminate himself as having a knife on school property. Thus in Criminal law if one has an illegal item, one can NOT be complied to turn it in. for to turn it in i to incriminate oneself. In effect if something is illegal and you have it, they MUST be a legal way for you to turn the item over (And not suffer ANY legal ramifications), if NOT the law does NOT apply to you for the law can NOT force you to turn over the item.

Thus ANY confiscation law or law making an item illegal MUST have a safe harbor clause i.e. a Clause saying "if you have an illegal item you can take it to X who will take it from you and the fact you turned it into X will NOT be used against you". For example it is illegal for ex-felons to possession a gun, but there is an exception if the ex-felon is turning it over to the Police (i.e. he Ex-felon calls the Police and said I have a Gun, come pick it up, that call and that gun can NOT be used against that ex-felon for having a gun).

One of the biggest problems with the Weapons policies of Schools is this total lack of any safe harbors in most such weapons policies. The Schools basically have said they are exempt from the Fifth Amendment for they are Schools not Police, but the Fifth Amendment applies to GOVERNMENT not just police.

Now most of the cases where a child has been expelled the Child was caught with the weapon. Thus the argument would have been the lack of safe harbor prevented the child from turning in the weapon, here we have the school only finding out about the weapon do to the CHILD turning in the weapon. If you are going to expel a child for TURNING IN THE WEAPON THAT THE SCHOOL KNEW NOTHING ABOUT, all that is going to do is encourage other children in such situations NOT to turn in the weapon. The questions then becomes HOW IS THIS PROTECTING THE OTHER CHILDREN?.

Contacting the School that their position is ridiculous is the only way to stop this expulsion and force the School Board to address the problems of an absolute ban as in this case. The more news coverage the better. The only other choice is take this up through the Court system and the Fifth Amendment grounds and force the State and Federal Court to address the Issue of the Fifth Amendment and the Schools.

Now my home state of Pennsylvania avoided this whole problem when it adopted its one year expulsion policy. The state required each school district to adopt a policy expelling child with weapons for one year BUT ALSO REQUIRED THAT A POLICY BE ADOPTED TO MITIGATE SUCH EXPULSIONS ON A CASE BY CASE BASIS'S. In Lyons v. Penn Hills Sch. Dist., 723 A.2d 1073, the Court STOPPED an expulsion when the School District when it adopted a policy of expulsion did NOT permit its Superintendent to waive the Expulsion if warrant by the case. The Failure of the School District to adopt a way to waive the mandatory expulsion violated the law and thus the expulsion could not take place (This permitted any Pennsylvania School to waive an Expulsion if the Fifth amendment was involved or other good cause).

[BlooInBloo]

81. I don't think minors have exactly the same rights...

Unless I'm much mistaken, of course...

[Hippo_Tron]

91. Through their legal guardians I believe that they do

The question is whether the bill of rights applies to public schools or just to courtrooms.

[proud2BlibKansan]

98. Actually they don't

Schools can search without a warrant and they can censure school newspapers. It's been held up in many court cases.

[Hippo_Tron]

99. That's basically what I was saying

The point is that whether students have constitutional rights at school is currently being debated legally.

[Solon]

103. Actually they do...

but only on their persons, and possibly cars, though that is debatable. The two examples you give are about police searches of SCHOOL property only and SCHOOL publications that are paid for from school or student funds. However, this doesn't mean that schools have the right to ban publications that aren't affiliated with the school and are published by students, nor that police can arbitrarily strip search students at will.

[Jack_DeLeon]

85. Another life lesson learned at school...

dont trust authority and never volunteer any information.

[Kerrytravelers]

93. Before we can make a judgment on anyone involved, I'd like the full story

This particular comment caught my attention.
On March 21, Superintendent Peggy Hinckley appointed an external hearing examiner. She wrote "there's reasonable grounds for investigation" after she reviewed the charges.


However, if this part is true, it makes me question the school
The principal pointed out he asked Elliot "if he knew of another situation at Stonybrook where a knife was involved and the consequences given. Elliot acknowledged he knew first-hand of the situation and outcome."

Elliot later explained in an interview that a knife fell out of a pocket of a classmate in February in a fourth-period class, and the boy was suspended and later expelled.



So, without getting the full story from an investigating third party (which is how my particular district handles this situations), it's really impossible to know exactly where the truth lies.

[ladjf]

102. I've been in education for 35 yrs and that administrative decision

was easily the dumbest I've heard as yet. What going on in that principals head?