Zero Tolerance for Zero Tolerance: Who’s With Me?
Because I have zero tolerance for making a five-year-old wet his pants over a cap gun:
A kindergartner who brought a cowboy-style cap gun onto his Calvert County school bus was suspended for 10 days after showing a friend the orange-tipped toy, which he had tucked inside his backpack on his way to school, according to his family and a lawyer.
The child was questioned for more than two hours before his mother was called, she said, adding that he uncharacteristically wet his pants during the episode. The boy is 5 — “all bugs and frogs and cowboys,” his mother said.
The cap gun was not loaded with caps — but if it had been . . .
According to the family, the boy’s friend had brought a water gun on the bus a day earlier. On Wednesday, unbeknown to his parents, the boy stowed his cap gun — from Frontier Town near Ocean City — inside his backpack as he left for school.
He told his mother after the incident that he had “really, really” wanted to show his friend.
The mother was called by the principal at 10:50 a.m. and was told that her son had the cap gun and pretended to shoot someone on the bus. She said that both the kindergartner and his first-grade sister, sitting nearby on the bus, disputed that account.
The mother said the principal told her that if the cap gun had been loaded with caps, it would have been deemed an explosive and police would have been called in.
Have any of you ever had a cap gun? I was a big fan of the Lone Ranger show when I was a kid, and I had a pair of white and silver cap guns designed to resemble the Lone Ranger’s weapons. They looked something like this:
And — horror of horrors! — I shot them with the caps in the gun!!!
Little did I know I possessed explosives.*
“Zero tolerance” has become code for “excuse to take overbearing actions that have no basis whatsoever in reasonable.” It’s high time we ended “zero tolerance” policies and replaced them with that old-fashioned policy called . . . common sense.
Via Hot Air.
(Although I will say: one time a dumb friend of mine got the idea of hitting a roll of caps with a hammer. After he did so and got a satisfyingly loud bang out of it, I did the same — and my ears instantly started ringing.)
Patterico (9c670f) — 6/1/2013 @ 12:43 pmI am intolerant of intolerance.
JD (14ffcf) — 6/1/2013 @ 12:44 pmAnd no, I never shot them off at school. But this kid was five. And he had no caps in the gun.
Patterico (9c670f) — 6/1/2013 @ 12:44 pmThe cap gun was not loaded with caps — but if it had been . . .
and what if they’d been hollow-point caps… teh so-called “kid killers”?!?! Teh mind reeeeeeeeeeels!
Colonel Haiku (04be0d) — 6/1/2013 @ 12:50 pmwhen I was a kid, one of the rights of passage was the ability to take a close range BB gunshot to the thigh area of your jeans and not tear up or, worse yet, cry. Kid did that nowadays he’d be serving 3 to 5 years in lock-up.
Colonel Haiku (04be0d) — 6/1/2013 @ 12:56 pmi’d suggest we outlaw idiocy, but there is no way a governmental body would make their very existence illegal.
redc1c4 (403dff) — 6/1/2013 @ 1:12 pmBecause the Common Core classroom implementation focuses on the Whole Child and values, attitudes, feelings, and beliefs are taught as proper targets for change now in the classroom in Ed degree programs, we are likely to keep hearing more of these stories. http://www.invisibleserfscollar.com/how-social-and-emotional-learning-as-the-primary-focus-is-coming-in-all-the-windows/
We have schools now measuring those changes as Learning and part of Student Growth and required to implement Positive Behavior Intervention Programs for all students. And the presence and intensity counts on whether the Principal is deemed effective and the school gets a good grade.
When behavioral changes are the focus of K-12, there are no boundaries to intrusion anymore. The veteran principals are being pushed into retirement. Replaced by people who may have barely taught and will push any policy or practice that will get them their next promotion.
This poor boy is simply a poster child for the lack of respect for personal boundaries being engendered in education degree programs now. Especially graduate programs.
Robin (801f44) — 6/1/2013 @ 1:24 pmIf they didn’t make any cap guns this kids shorts would be dry right now
E.PWJ (1ea63e) — 6/1/2013 @ 1:35 pmGreetings:
And from our way way back machine…
Even though I grew up in the Bronx in the afterglow of WW II, I was always more inclined to the cowboy ways. I had the twin Fanner-Fiftys cap pistol rig which was, unfortunately, one of the banes of my dear mother’s existence.
One summer’s day, she took me and my sister to the movies, double-features in those days. The second movie was “The Charge at Feather River”, not only an oat-burner, but a 3-D oat-burner. I was allowed to wear my rig but was warned against bringing any caps. In one of the very few failures of my mother’s eternal vigilance program, she forgot the body cavity search and I managed to secret two full rolls on my person. During the intermission, I slipped off to the lavatory and loaded up.
The highlight of the movie for me was, you guessed it, “The Charge at Feather River”. The besieged cavalry and cowpokes were attacked by the ferocious, in those days, pre-Native Americans. In unison, the latter loosed their arrows and spears which, through the miracle of 3-D, seemed to come pouring out of the screen directly at me and mine. What’s a boy-cowboy to do but to shoot up some caps to protect his mother, sister, and self. However, before I could get off even a handful of shots, my mother had re-established her normal level of control of both my property and my person.
Later that evening, my mother came into my room with that twinkle in her eye that meant “Your father wants to talk to you in the living room.” Denotations aside, the obvious connotation was that parental supervision had been kicked up a notch to the ultimate level. When I arrived in the living room, my father was involved with his evening beer, cigarette, and newspaper. I sat down as quietly as possible on the couch. My father lowered his broadsheet and gave me his sternest look. He then began his pre-waterboarding days interrogation.
“So,” my father began, “your mother took you to the movies this afternoon.” “She did,” I replied as my father’s look told me that that was all the answer required. “And, she let you take your six-guns.” Again, only the “She did.” “But, she told you no caps.” Once more, the “She did,” as the in-terror-gation proceeded along its course. “And, you took some anyway.” A quick switch to an “I did.” “And, you shot them off in the theater.” Again, an “I did” followed by a failed attempt to begin a litany of excuses for my actions.
“So,” my father began as he took a Lucky Strike pause, “How many Injuns d’ya kill?”
11B40 (066e9a) — 6/1/2013 @ 1:56 pmGreetings:
One more thing, at least those highly educated authorities didn’t pry the cap gun from his cold, dead hand.
11B40 (066e9a) — 6/1/2013 @ 1:57 pmRuining the careers of the school administrators who caused him to wet his pants would be a very nice start to reforming this idiocy.
pst314 (ae6bd1) — 6/1/2013 @ 1:59 pmZero tolerance is only ever about absolving those “in charge” of the obligation to make an informed decision when something untoward occurs. If you are not required to make a decision, then you cannot make a mistake and therefore can never be blamed. Classic CYA tactics.
Gazzer (716db0) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:11 pmIt’s high time we ended “zero tolerance” policies and replaced them with that old-fashioned policy called . . . common sense.
couldn’t agree more. Unfortunately, what we call common sense is highly uncommon anymore. Exercising common sense would probably be more dangerous to state apparatchiks than waterboarding a confession (to something) out of this kid.
It dawned on me 20 years ago that one of the main objectives of PC enforcers was to quash common sense and they’ve largely succeeded.
PC, being cultural Marxism, thus cannot abide common sense. which when you think about it is all that common sense is or was. A common set of standards/expectations for a civil society.
Chris (eafa5f) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:14 pmDe-stigmatizing ignorance.
Jim (a96efa) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:16 pmTime to license cap guns
in_awe (7c859a) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:22 pmsuspension lifted!!
remains on permanent record
pants still wet
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/suspension-scaled-back-for-boy-5-who-brought-cowboy-style-cap-gun-on-school-bus/2013/05/31/5fdab2d6-ca24-11e2-9245-773c0123c027_story.html
elissa (9e2800) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:24 pmThe questioning sounds like child abuse.
htom (412a17) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:29 pmZero tolerance has less to do with replacing common sense and more with absolving teachers and administrators with the burden of justifying a punishment for a student.
Sean (a4178b) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:31 pmTime to license cap guns
Comment by in_awe (7c859a) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:22 pm
Trigger locks maybe?
think of the crisis that would have created for the bumbling bureaucrats if he’d showed up with a cap gun outfitted with a locking mechanism. Oh the horror!
Chris (eafa5f) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:31 pmThe kicker is that the school administrators told his mom that the kid “should have felt comfortable enough to ask to use the bathroom.”
elissa (9e2800) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:32 pmZero tolerance has less to do with replacing common sense and more with absolving teachers and administrators with the burden of justifying a punishment for a student.
Comment by Sean (a4178b) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:31 pm
I see your point and don’t doubt that’s part of it. but I still think it’s part of trying to redefine the culture. Zero tolerance means a fifteen year old girl can’t carry a couple of advils but she is free, encouraged actually, to seek out plan B or condoms for example.
Chris (eafa5f) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:35 pmMaybe all the kids should bring in cap guns. and then sit in their seats and piss their pants.
kaf (81bcc7) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:47 pmI like what Iowahawk said:
And:
I believe we should close all public schools and give parents vouchers. When my oldest son was in 3rd grade, the principle illegally told him it was against the law for him to say grace over his lunch. The LAUSD General Counsel’s office told me she was wrong, but she was never disciplined and did not apologize to my son. When I could, I finally sent my children to private school where they did much better for half the money per student than LAUSD. It was a financial hardship for me as a single dad, but was worth it.
While we’re at it, let’s get rid of the federal education department that was created by one of our worst presidents, Jimmy Carter. The education department was one of the last gifts given to us by Jimmy Carter in Oct 1979. The education department has been an expensive failure for the last 33 years. We didn’t need an education department for over 200 years and gave our children a good enough education to send a man to the moon, why do we need one now? When I graduated high school my high school diploma gave me the opportunity for a good job. Now a high school diploma is worthless. A secretary (administrative assistant) needs at least 2 years of college, where in my day most secretaries didn’t even have a high school diploma. Almost all students who graduate from public high school have to take remedial English and math when they enter college.
Look how good the voucher system did in Washington DC. Then Obama had it killed. We can’t have a private school educated populace, they might not vote democrat. If they stay in the public school system, there will always be low information voters to vote democrat.
Tanny O'Haley (f5fbfe) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:51 pmAmerican public schools are deeply perverted and abusive of children
It’s a thing
happyfeet (c60db2) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:52 pmalso they don’t educate worth a crap – so the whole exercise if pretty much a huge waste of everyone’s time and money
happyfeet (c60db2) — 6/1/2013 @ 2:54 pm“Zero tolerance” is shorthand for “Zero reasoning.”
I have no tolerance for these moronic, fascist thugs intent on intimidating everyone near them and indoctrinating kids to become little jack-booted, mindless thugs.
Take your kids out of public indoctrination centers! They can’t do this to our kids if we don’t submit by sending kids into the system.
It is a win-win situation for everyone.
WarEagle82 (2b7355) — 6/1/2013 @ 3:12 pmZero tolerance is for lawsuit avoidance. They have “zero tolerance” for weapons, so when they suspend a black kid for bringing a knife to school, they can say it was just policy, not racially motivated, and look, we made a 5-year-old white kid wet his pants for bringing a toy gun to school.
Anthony (d7b215) — 6/1/2013 @ 3:34 pmThe kicker is that the school administrators told his mom that the kid “should have felt comfortable enough to ask to use the bathroom.”
How did that person not get punched?
JD (b63a52) — 6/1/2013 @ 4:10 pmMaybe if we had better parents? Not saying that the parents of this child are not, saying more like grains of wheat getting burned with the chaff.
nk (875f57) — 6/1/2013 @ 4:26 pmI was born in the 50’s. Not only did I have cap guns, but by they time I was 10 I routinely had BB guns, rode a bike without a helmet in traffic miles from my home, and played unsupervised with fireworks.
Today, not only would this be called “free range parenting” (or illegal) but each of these is likely enough to get Child Services called in in most metropolitan areas.
Kevin M (bf8ad7) — 6/1/2013 @ 4:28 pmThis is deliberate. If, every time kids are near anything gun-like or gun-reminiscent they get all kinds of crap dumped on them, they will become gun-adverse. Which is the whole point.
Kevin M (bf8ad7) — 6/1/2013 @ 4:35 pmIt’s high time we ended “zero tolerance” policies and replaced them with that old-fashioned policy called . . . common sense.
UH, Pat, I just have one question. Being that most teachers are liberals, whereinhell are you gonna find common sense?
peedoffamerican (c1642d) — 6/1/2013 @ 4:41 pmIn the Texas ISD that I attended, all of the boys brought cap guns to school locked and fully loaded with caps. Even some of the girls did too! My prize possession was a “Tommy Gun” that my uncle had bought for me, and it was fully automatic! The only rule? You don’t fire them in the classroom or inside the school (unless it was raining and recess held in auditorium) because if you did, the teacher would retain possession of them until the end of the school year when the kids would then be able to collect all of the things that the teachers had confiscated from them.
Same school held grades 1-12 and later K-12. When I was a youngun there wadn’t no sech thing as kiddiegarten.
All the boys and some of the girls in high school had shotguns and rifles prominently displayed in gun racks in their pickemup trucks. And believe me, in that part of the country there wadn’t no sech thing as an unloaded weepon atall. Many snakes, rabid skunks, raccoons, occasional wolf, etc. were all dispatched on school grounds at various times by one of the student body at the request of the superintendent. He was a lousy shot himself.
And horror of horrors, one of them there magazine distributing companies offered prizes of guns for the most sold. Classmate of mine won 14 various rifles and shotguns. Hell, we even were allowed to carry us some pocket knives in class. Many’s the time a teacher would borry mine cus I always kept mine with a razor edge. The better to cut the bailing twine of hay bales when I had to feed our cattle after getting out of school.
Want to know the funny thing about it all? NOT EVEN one school shooting or knifing of a child ever happened!
On my honor, all of the above is absolutely true. It is not a parody, allegory, or make believe in any way. It is the God’s honest 100 percent truth.
peedoffamerican (04dfe5) — 6/1/2013 @ 5:13 pmmagazines hardly even exist anymore except for rest homes and doctor’s offices
happyfeet (8ce051) — 6/1/2013 @ 5:17 pmCommon sense passed on sometime in 1968. He was replaced in the firmament by I didn’t do it, It’s not my fault, and How dare you.
glenn (647d76) — 6/1/2013 @ 5:24 pmmister happy, i think i will make a doctor’s appointment, just so i can browse thru architectural digest—i like the photos of magnificent homes.
Elephant Stone (8d2c6e) — 6/1/2013 @ 5:58 pmwhaaa?
you can google many photos of magnificent homes using your computer machine plus certain specific tubes and wires Mr. Stone
it’s a cornucopia of magnificence what you have right here at the tippy tippy tips of your fingers!
happyfeet (8ce051) — 6/1/2013 @ 6:01 pmYeah Mr Feets, it sort of tells off on my age doesn’t it?
peedoffamerican (35b482) — 6/1/2013 @ 6:03 pmthings change so fast these days
you can tell my age cause of how I remember how the concept of economic freedom used to be part of many many policy discussions – right here in America!
seems like forever ago
brb that’s probably my cue to slather on some loreal hydra-renewal
happyfeet (8ce051) — 6/1/2013 @ 6:06 pmThat is one reason to go to the doctor I suppose, but now when I only want an X-Ray I just go to the airport and since I’m there I just mention Al Qaeda for a digital rectal exam at no extra charge.
nk (875f57) — 6/1/2013 @ 6:18 pmI always assumed that somewhere there were lawyers who made these policies who were eager to protect administrators from other lawyers who were eager to litigate.
Am I not correct?
Yes, we too knew a girl who was kicked out of her advanced placement high school here in town because one day she wore her jacket with the swiss army knife in the pocket.
She ended up getting a college scholarship for fencing anyway.
No excuse for detaining a young child without immediately calling the parent. Maybe the mom should run for school board…
MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 6/1/2013 @ 6:29 pmMaybe the first time a school administrator makes a mistake they should be fired. Zero tolerance, after all.
MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 6/1/2013 @ 6:30 pmI wish this zero tolerance thing would apply to jihadists. I want fairness. Or whatever.
Elephant Stone (8d2c6e) — 6/1/2013 @ 6:38 pmThe little boy should have made a statement to the principal, then asserted his fifth amendment rights.
Elephant Stone (8d2c6e) — 6/1/2013 @ 6:41 pmI know what statement I would have made! A one finger salute with the appropriate accompanying words.
peedoffamerican (127915) — 6/1/2013 @ 6:49 pmQuestioned the child?? Little Boy, we don’t allow cap guns on the bus, you can have your cap gun back when you are dropped off at home.
END OF STORY.
Gus (694db4) — 6/1/2013 @ 6:59 pmMom is a teacher at the nearby high school.
nk (875f57) — 6/1/2013 @ 7:03 pm“It takes a village…”
to get kids to embrace disarmament.
Seriously, does anyone imagine that while the teacher’s unions are forcing the kids to write to Obama to demand more gun control they’re also terrorizing the kids who don’t show the officially approved attitude toward guns?
Steve57 (9b1cdb) — 6/1/2013 @ 7:12 pmIf only “zero tolerance” applied to the idiotic policies public indoctrination center administrators and teachers employed. They would all be closed over-night…
WarEagle82 (2b7355) — 6/1/2013 @ 7:14 pm*does anyone imagine it’s an accident*
Steve57 (9b1cdb) — 6/1/2013 @ 7:20 pmWe all know caps are a gateway explosive. Today caps, tomorrow thermonuclear bombs.
Patterico wants us all to be vaporized!
Rich Horton (3ef32b) — 6/1/2013 @ 7:21 pmIn other news, the United States government completed its sale of fighter jets to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt !
Elephant Stone (8d2c6e) — 6/1/2013 @ 7:51 pmWhen caps are outlawed, only outlaws will have caps.
Gus (694db4) — 6/1/2013 @ 7:52 pmSeriously, these repeated incidents at PUBLIC SCHOOLS are not the EXCEPTION. This is how AYERS, ALYNSKI, et al have co-opted and corrupted our Public Education system.
We should sponsor a Fast & Furious shipment of cap guns to the kids of Calvert County.
Elephant Stone (8d2c6e) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:05 pmWhen I was a kid, every kid had a cap gun. Well, some of the girls did not, but the few I liked did.
Somehow or another we all grew up to be functioning adults without shooting our neighbors with a real gun.
Honestly, does anyone know a little boy who doesn’t grab a stick and make it into a gun or a sword?
As much as liberals, moms or dads, want their little boys or girls to conform to some sort of progressive idea, they are simply going to do what all kids do.
Maybe we should pay attention to our children,
Ag80 (eb6ffa) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:10 pmAg80. Where is our GUN VIOLENCE problem most obvious and out of control??
Yes.
What do the politicians in these area’s have in common?
Yes.
Where is the highest illiteracy and illegitimacy??
Yes.
See a pattern yet?
Gus (694db4) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:15 pmI must have missed the email. When did we give petty functionaries the power to deem things that aren’t true to be true?
A teacher can “deem” a poptart to be a gun?
A finger can be “deemed” a gun if it’s accompanied by a toddler saying “bang, bang.”
And now caps which can be sold in toy stores can be “deemed” explosives.
When exactly did that happen?
Steve57 (9b1cdb) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:30 pmthinking about it now… i’m pretty sure steve jobs was an ardent food stamp fascist to the end I think
he sure as hell wasn’t a for reals american
(this is why they had to get a whore to play him in the movie)
happyfeet (8ce051) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:31 pmSteve Jobs?
nk (875f57) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:35 pmyes. Steve Jobs.
what. a. tool.
happyfeet (8ce051) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:36 pmhere is a phone, bitch
thank you Mr. Jobs!
pay me more monies and I make it white, bitch
thank you Mr. Jobs!
happyfeet (8ce051) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:37 pmI played with cap guns in the 1950’s. I had a Roy Rogers brown leather, double buckle, double rig with stag grips. My buddy had a Hopalong Cassidy double, black leather, black stag. Pearl grips were for grrls. Don’t remember taking them to school.
I do remember taking real guns to school, show and tell in elementary school, hunting in middle school and high school. Never got in trouble about it, or about knives, sheath or folding, which everyone carried.
htom (412a17) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:37 pmMr. Feets:
I don’t know the late Mr. Jobs, but I can bet you one thing: He picked up a stick or a cap gun at some point in his life and said, “Pchew.”
That probably makes him an American regardless of his food stamp tendencies or the whore who plays him in a movie.
Ag80 (eb6ffa) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:39 pmNot to be too flippant. I do realize that if a potential terrorist pays enough to get the inside information to hijack THE 18 wheeler loaded entirely with caps for toy guns and spends a year tearing them open and pouring the contents into pressure cookers he might succeed in building a bomb or two.
Steve57 (9b1cdb) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:39 pmyou’re one of those glass half full people I can tell
happyfeet (8ce051) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:40 pmIt seems they have much more tolerance for the stupid
narciso (3fec35) — 6/1/2013 @ 8:41 pmMr. Feets, you have an instinct about people.
Steve57 (9b1cdb) — 6/1/2013 @ 9:19 pmZero tolerance is bad. I think we can all agree on that. But to raise it in this context is, I think, to miss the point.
Zero tolerance means there is a proper rule, which ought to be enforced most of the time, but there are marginal cases where common sense tells us that we should tolerate the offense, either by turning a blind eye or by slapping the offender on the wrist so they know not to do it again. The principle here is de minimis non curat lex. And zero tolerance means to ignore that principle; it means saying that a particular rule is so important that there can be no de minimis margin, and every infringement must be taken seriously. For example the rule against joking about bombs at the airport; zero tolerance there might make sense.
Now if we stipulate that the rule against bringing weapons into school makes sense, zero tolerance would be punishing the kid who came to school directly from hunting, and forgot to leave his gun at home. Common sense tells us that we should treat this with understanding, but zero tolerance argues that this rule is too important to allow any margin.
But in this case zero tolerance is irrelevant, since no toleration is being called for.
Milhouse (3d0df0) — 6/1/2013 @ 9:40 pmThere was no valid rule violated, and therefore there was nothing to tolerate. If there exists a rule against non-realistic representations of guns, it’s a bad rule, an invalid rule, one that should never be enforced, not a good rule that should be enforced except in de minimis cases.
Now that would be zero tolerance. Maybe a good idea, maybe not. But the correct analogy here would be a school administrator for using the word “mistake”.
Milhouse (3d0df0) — 6/1/2013 @ 10:44 pmHell! I used to take a whole roll of caps and hit it with a hammer. It sounded like a cherry bomb!!
Hangtown Bob (af208f) — 6/2/2013 @ 8:14 amAs a kid, I certainly took a cap gun to school, keeping it in my pocket. If I had been caught (tattled on by the boys who knew I had it), it would probably have been confiscated until the end of the day on the last day of school, and then returned. People weren’t as scared of toys back in the day.
Some of the older kids were worse. They drilled out the barrels of some plastic toys which fired a different type of cap, a ring of plastic cylinders filled with the powder. The modification allowed them to fire navy beans. They stung like hell, but I have no lasting injuries.
tek (ed7b36) — 6/2/2013 @ 3:45 pmI spent a lot of time trying to get a wax knob on the back end of darning needles. You could get some serious muzzle velocity through a straw. Also, they were pretty stable. Did each one individually. Never thought of making a mold.
Richard Aubrey (6c93a4) — 6/3/2013 @ 5:00 amDifferent world. Mattel made what was a very good–said our fathers–imitation of an M3 grease gun or a German MP39. Can’t recall. Wound it up and it would fire an entire role of caps. The cyclic rate was slow enough that, with trigger manipulation, you could select, so to speak, single shots or full auto.
Then there was an item that looked vaguely like a Lewis gun minus the pie plate on top. Barrel shroud and bipod. Hand cranked to fire a roll of caps. Every block needed a couple of squad automatics. Nobody bothered with the BAR, though. Funny.
Our esteemed host said:
And just where do you expect to find common sense amongst the education establishment?
The amazed Dana (3e4784) — 6/3/2013 @ 5:31 amThe “zero tolerance” policies are, as was mentioned above, designed to shield school districts from lawsuits, by not allowing them to use discretion which might result in a discrimination charge. Trouble is, in this case, the school district has set itself up for a lawsuit: interrogating a kindergartener for two hours, to the point that he wet his pants, is clearly an abusive tactic. Further, while the child is not named here, you can be certain that the other kids heard about little Johnnie peeing his pants, and he will be subjected to humiliation when he returns to kindergarten.
Here’s hoping that the parents sue the school, and demand, as part of their compensation, that all of the involved school officials be terminated.
The amused Dana (3e4784) — 6/3/2013 @ 5:38 amAnd when I was in school, we not only brought knives to school, but we traded knives on the school grounds, openly, and nobody cared.
Dana, Mt Sterling High School, Class of 1971 (3e4784) — 6/3/2013 @ 5:41 amAnd if you think that’s bad:
What’s that our host said about common sense?
The incredulous Dana (3e4784) — 6/3/2013 @ 8:13 am