St.Johnsbury set to adopt zero tolerance weapon policy
School board takes aim at weapons policy
St.Johnsbury school board directors are cautiously embracing an expansive zero tolerance policy for weapons. Although several board members are leery of the policy it is being constructed on more or less traditional ZT lines.
Weapons are defined as “any weapon, whether loaded or unloaded, which will or is designed to or may be readily converted to expel a projectile by the action of an explosive.”
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If a student is caught with a gun or other form of weapon, they will be expelled for the year, if they don’t achieve exemption status, according to the proposed policy/procedure.
The policy is being adopted to come into compliance with the federal Gun Free Schools Act of 1994. That act mandates that all schools receiving federal funding must have a zero tolerance policy for firearms. Like most schools, St.Johnsbury isn’t stopping there. Emphasis in the following quote is mine:
Examples include a firearm, explosive, poison gas, mine or any object known to be able to produce “death or serious bodily injury.” No mention is made of knives or the like in the policy, but in the procedure section of the document, knives, darts and “unauthorized tools” could be considered weapons at the discretion of school authorities.
School District Board Chairman Gregory MacDonald is normally concerned with zero tolerance policy language but believes the proposed policy has enough “wiggle room”.
Students are exempt from expulsion when carrying weapons if the student did not know he or she brought the weapon to school, the student did not intend to use the weapon to threaten others, the “student is disabled and the misconduct is related to the disability or the student does not present an ongoing threat to others and a lengthy expulsion would not serve the best interests of the pupil.”
Not enough, Mr.MacDonald. What is the reason for a policy that criminalizes an action and sets the violator through an expulsion hearing process when the decision of the hearing board is already prescribed by the policy? Do you see the futility? Here is a theoretical example:
A student forgets to take his fishing box out of his trunk. Inside it is a scaling knife and a small utility knife. He is immediately suspended and put through the expulsion process according to the zero tolerance policy. At the expulsion hearing the board finds that it is an obvious case of accidental or incidental possession and there was no danger. They send the boy back to school.
Why was the boy in this example suspended and put through the expulsion process? Because that was required by the zero tolerance policy. Without a zero tolerance policy the administrator who discovered the knives could have handled the situation in a competent and logical manner. With the policy, insanity was mandated.
Jim,
I think I read this differently than you do:
>>”knives, darts and “unauthorized tools” could be considered weapons at the discretion of school authorities”
The rest of my comment got cut off somehow.
I think the “at the descretion” language allows the school official to determine that the scaling knife is not a weapon. If so, this is astep in the right direction.
The huge distraction is creating policy instead of addressing the causes of problems. We are allowing child authority to create public policy based on what makes schools easy to manage, and not what educates children. We ignore the fact that adult feedback, adult supervision, repetitve exercise and repeated experiences in success motivate children to succeed. Policy that replaces adult intervention with management techniques creates friction will only exaggerate the problems and make more draconian measures easy to justify.
The proposed policy appears to comply with the federal requirements, but also allows the administration to make case-by-case decisions based on their best judgment(e.g., whether, in your example, the knife was a “weapon”) prior to an expulsion hearing. It’s not clear to me from your excerpt when the finding of facts (and possible “exemption”) occurs and what triggers the expulsion hearing.
If this policy isn’t quite right, let’s point out a specific one that is superior, and why. This school board seems amenable to suggestions.
And, as a private boarding academy, beyond meeting federal requirements (assuming they are accepting federal assistance), they should write whatever the heck they want…