ZeroIntelligence.net

The Supreme Court recently heard Morse v. Frederick, which captured the attention of the general public because of the appeal of how most people know it: the “Bong Hits 4 Jesus” case. In essence, the Court’s ruling has strengthened the powers of discipline on the part of school administrators by holding that the First Amendment guarantees of free speech do not hold for public school students when that speech promotes illegal drug use.

One might think that this column would be disappointed, but the opinions of the 5-4 majority in this case are based on principles we actually support. Discipline of students that have in some way threatened the safety of others or disrupted the educational process is an important part of teaching those children to be positive contributors to our greater society. Rather, our objection is to the transfer of intelligent and appropriate discipline to a mindless application of zero tolerance policies that cast the disciplinary net too wide and know no difference between the harmless play of children and the malevolence of true juvenile delinquents. Thus do little green army men and real, loaded guns brought to school as a threat or tool for harm become equally offensive, administrators lose all credibility, and children lose instead of learn.

The Supreme Court did not explicitly address zero tolerence, but in a majority concurring opinion, Justice Stephen Breyer wrote, “Students will test the limits of acceptable behavior in myriad ways better known to schoolteachers than to judges; school officials need a degree of flexible authority to respond to disciplinary challenges; and the law has always considered the relationship between teachers and students special.” Flexible authority is the polar opposite of zero tolerance. We can only hope that public school administrators will listen to Justice Breyer and the Court and come to their senses on this foolish trend.

If you have time, you should really read the entire decision. Justice Breyer’s quote is on page 39. Justice Thomas’ concurring opinion, beginning on page 19, is also an excellent discussion of school discipline.

Paul Clinton of the Daily Breeze reports on an elementary school’s narrow avoidance of a horror only a step shy of another Virginia Tech massacre. Shortly before fifth-grade graduation at the Cornerstone School at Pedregal, the administration discovered that eleven students were planning on bringing military weapons to the event. Fortunately, the safety of the children attending was assured by prompt and decisive action on the part of Principal Denise Leonard (leonardd@mail.pvpusd.k12.ca.us.)

The students were required to clip off the ends of the weapons with scissors. You see, the dangerous weapons were those carried by little green army men mounted, in Cornerstone School tradition, on the mortarboards of the graduating fifth-graders.

Leonard’s diligence helped prevent a major incident in keeping with the school’s zero tolerance policies on weapons and administrative intelligence.

The Washington Post reports today on some nonsense at Kilmer Middle School in Vienna, Virginia. A boy has been disciplined for hugging his girlfriend in violation of the school’s “no touching” rule.

That’s right, no touching, of any sort. According to the rules, hugging your boyfriend or girlfriend violates the rules, as do high-fives, pats on the back, hand-holding, and so on. Hopefully, delivering CPR and the Heimlich Manuever are excluded, although it doesn’t appear to be that way.

From the article: “Deborah Hernandez, Kilmer’s principal, said the rule makes sense in a school that was built for 850 students but houses 1,100. She said that students should have their personal space protected and that many lack the maturity to understand what is acceptable or welcome.” At the end of middle school, you can be assured that they still won’t understand what is acceptable or welcome as they will have less experience interacting with others in a natural environment than is normal.

Consider what other similar bans could be instituted for similar reasons.

No talking: “Students should have their feelings protected from hurtful comments and many lack the maturity to understand what is acceptable or welcome.”

No writing: “Students should have their feelings protected from hurtful writings and many lack the maturity to understand what is acceptable or welcome.”

No looking at each other: “Students should have their feelings protected from disapproving and angry looks and many lack the maturity to understand what is acceptable or welcome.”

I’ve personally encouraged my daughter to consider attending an online high school instead of the public high school, but her main objection is the danger of losing out on opportunities for social interaction. Should rules such as “no touching” expand, the ability to have normal social interaction will go away and her main reason for going to the school will go with it. Why do school adminstrators believe children enter their schools still in need of learning academic subjects, but should already know everything there is to know about proper social interaction?

And to take that question down another path, why are our public schools pushing sex education at younger and younger ages and decrying abstinence education as ineffective, yet pushing some kind of “touch abstinence” answer to activities like handshakes?

Thanks go to Brian McDonald for steering me to this article. As a humorous aside, I think that an article about discipline over a hug could have little better name for the main character than “Hal Beaulieu”. His last name fits the article in a subtle way, much like one I noticed some time ago involving a policeman named Peter Couture.

Bringing a grenade to school for show-and-tell isn’t a terribly bright idea. Howver, I can understand a kid seeing it as no big deal when it was a disarmed WWII grenade that had likely been laying around the house since before he was born.

CBC News reports that in Moncton, New Brunswick, a boy has been suspended for five days for bringing the harmless grenade to school. Central to the story:

The disarmed Second World War grenade turned out to be harmless, but the principal said he won’t tolerate any kind of weapon on school property.

Principal Mike Whittleton said the boy has to face the consequences of his actions.

“The seriousness of the event determines the amount of time that he’ll be suspended,” Whittleton said Tuesday. “This is a fairly serious event, so he’ll be suspended for five days.”

Hopefully no students will bring a rock to school for geology class show-and-tell, since that would be similarly dangerous as a disarmed grenade. I just wonder what it would take for Whittleton to consider an event unimportant.

The Danvers Herald has a jaw-dropping article filled with the Danvers School Committee’s consideration of revisions to school handbook rules. The disconnects with reality come one after another.

For example, I think even those opposed to zero tolerance policies can agree that high school students taking heroin in school is wrong and worthy of significant disciplinary measures. After all, it’s an illegal drug and using it causes all kinds of negative side effects. Which side effect concerns Danvers? Get this:

“We just want to keep our school safe,” said [Acting Principal Mark] Strout, explaining the new availability of the police dog search unit, noting that a student on heroin could fall down the stairs and be injured.

At least two School Committee members mentioned problems with zero tolerance policies, such as the presumption of guilt before evidence and the removal of any allowance for discretion on the part of school administrators. While the final vote isn’t until August, the proposed changes were accepted unanimously. It appears these problems aren’t going to stop anyone from approving them.

Here’s another example of what should alarm people:

“I have the right to search. They don’t,” Strout said. “Even if the police are with me, they have to get a search warrant.”

There are several more. I leave it as an exercise for the student to see if you can spot them all.

As reported in the Wisconsin State Journal, zero tolerance policies applied blindly are not the only way or best way to approach school discipline.

The Madison school district has introduced a “fix-it plan” alternative to the standard discipinary measures. The students involved (such as in a schoolyard fight) are given the option of coming up with their own plan for discipline. The one described in the article had two fighting children electing to spend two days of recess playing catch with a football with each other exclusively.

The system is working. This particular article has a lot of information about the positive benefits and you should read it now. Next time someone tells you zero tolerance is the right solution for school discipline, describe Madison’s solution as a total rebuttal of that contention.

I don’t think I’ve ever read a clearer example of “Zero tolerance equals zero intelligence” than a recent article in the Gulf Breeze News.

A female student was expelled for bringing prescription drugs to school and giving them to another student. (The mother has claimed she finally succumbed to sustained peer pressure from the other girl.) If that was that, I’d have to agree punishment is deserved. Her mother didn’t want to see her daughter sent to the alternative school, so chose to tackle the disciplinary effort herself and appeal to the school board to allow her efforts to replace the standard punishment.

The mother required her daughter to research the dangers around the abuse of prescription drugs and put together a program that could be used to teach other children on the subject. Having completed this work, managed voluntarily by the mother, she requested her daughter be readmitted to her regular school. She further offered to put her daughter through any kind of drug program or other summer school program if this could happen.

School board? No dice.

Superintendent of Schools John Rogers admitted it was great what the mother had done, but fell back on the precedent of previous punishments meted out for similar offenses. He said to the mother, “How would we explain to them, if we made an exception here, why they have to go there and your daughter does not?”

I have an idea. Rogers could say something like, “Her mother took an active interest in her subsequent discipline and worked with her through a community service effort designed to directly counter the problem at no expense to taxpayers. Perhaps you could do the same and return to your regular school.”

School Board Chair Hugh Winkles said, “When it comes to weapons and drugs, we cannot do anything less than zero tolerance. We have drawn this line in the sand, and we cannot change it now.”

My interpretation: “We had a thought and we are disinclined to entertain a different one. We must instead stick to this one and only way of handling things.” I sure wish Winkles would go on record in opposition to the ever-changing ways schools seem to use in teaching arithmetic. None of the techniques used when I was a child apply anymore and it seems each of my three children has been taught differently.

Two other school board members asked to see the program, anticipating incorporating some or all it into next year’s curriculum. How many other students sent off to an alternative high school have supplied such a tool? And how many more parents will bother to attempt alternative and highly educational discipline of their own children after understanding how little good it will do them directly?