Knife wielding maniac stopped in Texas school

[Isabo]

"Christina Lough, a 13-year old A+ student at Garland McMeans Junior High in Katy, Texas, is spending seven days in a "special disciplinary class" and will lose her post as student council and honor society president, because -- you guessed it -- she was caught at school with a small folding knife used for pencil sharpening. Zero tolerance, don't you know: "If we vary from the rules, that's when the rules fall apart," notes school district lawyer Christopher Gilbert."

What next? No pens because they are sharp pointy objects and nice people write and draw with a keyboard?

[RickM]

Where's the common sense?

I wouldn't be surprised if they send the girl to a Psychiatrist and prescribe a nice healthy cocktail of meds for her. That would be about par for the course.

[Moses]

Our educational system is run by ideological morons with little common sense. It's amazing that the system works. Oh, that's right! It doesn't work! Despite an amazing flow of resources, the educational system has an extremely poor record.

Well, they may not be learning calculus, but at least they are being protected from this knife-wielding menace.

[surflvr911sc]

Nobody could have said it better Moses.

I don’t know if it feels good or bad to know that CA isn’t the only state that creates and follows rules/laws written by imbeciles. I would like to think that the other states would at least cancel CA out in DC but that seems to be a pipe dream too. Aaaaaagh!

I need coffee.

[nostatic]

I have a kid in the CA public schools, and I can say that while our school is very highly rated (one reason we moved to a stoopid-expensive part of town), they are pretty intolerant of anyone who is "different", and want a bunch of quiet sedated kids who score well on standardized test. gawd forbid you have a realy bright but pain-in-the arse kid who challenges authority and is smarter than the teachers (even in 1st grade).

Now we're setting up an IEP. That should be fun...

[CJFusco]

"a realy bright but pain-in-the arse kid who challenges authority and is smarter than the teachers"

ahh memories In all seriousness, I suspected that the teachers were less intelligent than me way back, probably in junior high school.

Did you ever notice that the really smart kids in school are the ones that sit in the back row and never turn in their homework? There's a big difference between being smart and working hard...

[Moses]

Let's design a public education system!

First, we'll have absolutely no accountability for results. School districts that perpetually fail do not need to be restructured. They need more money.

Second, let's give all our teachers job security. Tenure is a great idea. If a teacher continually fails to perform, well... maybe the district needs more money.

If bright kids continue to underperform it must be due to some dysfunctional family dynamic. So let's persue positive social engineering in our schools! (We can't teach them to read and write, so let's make them good little citizens!)

Above all, celebrate diversity! Remember, our definition of diversity: People who LOOK different, but think the SAME.

You know what? With enough money this just might work!

[Dantilla]

When kids cannot even have any cough drops- zero tolerance for drugs, ya know, all we are teaching is that we are hyper sensetive about drugs, and loose any credibility when mommy and daddy's medicine cabinet has bottles of pills.

The lesson? Don't listen.

[emcon5]

A few years ago there was a news story on a kid who got suspended for bringing a gun to school. It was a pistol for his G.I. Joe, about the size of a postage stamp.

Had to kick him out, "zero tolerance".

Stupidity runs rampant.

Tom

[RickM]

Quote: "... and will lose her post as student council and honor society president"

And I always thought the war was against boys....

http://www.thbookservice.com/bookpage.asp?prod_cd=c5608

[nostatic]

Originally posted by Dantilla
When kids cannot even have any cough drops- zero tolerance for drugs, ya know, all we are teaching is that we are hyper sensetive about drugs, and loose any credibility when mommy and daddy's medicine cabinet has bottles of pills.

The lesson? Don't listen.

Zero tolerance for drugs at school? They have become almost REQURIED! About 10% of the boys at elementary school take schedule II narcotics every day (Ritalin and related meds).

[RickM]

Quote from belowmentioned link:
" [www.CapitalismMagazine.com] The motto used to be: "Boys will be boys." Today, the motto seems to be: "Boys will be medicated."

Of nearly 20 million prescriptions written last year for drugs to treat "attention deficit hyperactivity disorder," most were for children and most of those children were boys. This is part of a growing tendency to treat boyhood as a pathological condition that requires a new three R's -- repression, re-education and Ritalin.

Some schools have gone to such extremes as banning recess, since boys tend to be boisterous at recess. Competitive sports are likewise banned or made non-competitive, sometimes by banning winning and losing. An aptly titled book, "The War Against Boys" by Christina Hoff Sommers, catalogs the amazing array of things that schools do to keep boys from being boys."

http://capmag.com/article.asp?ID=1173

[nostatic]

that book is spot on with regards to the problems...too bad it blames "feminism", and in so doing, loses impact with it's rhetoric.

Schools ARE biased against boys these days. The rules at my son's elementary school are nuts. They insist that young buys sit still for extended periods of time and "play nice." At one school in Santa Monica, they outlawed the game of tag because it was competitive and made people feel bad. How about we teach people that it is OK to lose sometimes?

Don't get me started on my school rants. I know our principal and asst. principal by first name, and we have fought back and forth on a regular basis. There is a systematic problem and boys are now considered "abnormal" if they are active and want to play rough. But I don't blame "feminism". I blame laziness and a desire for conformity and things to be easy.

[RickM]

Todd, I feel for you. I have a six year old girl so there's another set of issues to deal with. I agree with the laziness comment.

If I were raised in todays world I'd most likely be the Ritalin poster boy. However, where I went to school the Ritalin of the day was an A$$ Kicking by the nuns.

[12own911]

[i]Now we're setting up an IEP. That should be fun... [/B]

May want to explain the IEP for non-IEP peoples. IEP stands for Individualized Education Plan for Special kids be it High or Low funtioning kids... or kids that are different from the Norm...

[JavaBrewer]

What parents have to realize is that schools will generally submit to their wishes - you just have to push the right buttons to get the results. Our son has had his challenges and we have had to fight on all levels of the school system (County -> Teacher) to make sure he gets what he needs to succeed. So far we've have had success and are happy with his school and progress.

Beyond that it's the parent's responsibility to become involved and participate as much as possible - leading by example as it were. If you do not take an active role in your student's school experience then you are risking a great deal. With today's two working adult households its saddening to see so many kids dumped off at the curb while the parents race to get to work. A lot of parents in my son's first grade class have never sat and spoke to the teacher let alone meet or even know the name of the schools principal.

Zero tolerance is like the 3 strike law - a scape goat for real people making informed decisions.

[RickM]

Good point about the importance of parenting. A friend recently described his frustration on how the school wasn't teaching his six year old son values and pushing him to read better.... "for the money"....almost like he was buying a TV set and getting a substandard product.
I politely told him that money won't replace what a parent(s) should be doing. Granted some schools are better than others.

[JavaBrewer]

What kills me today are the demands and expectations put on little guys and girls these days. My son is behind the curve on speach and language yet he has basic reading and writing skills - in first grade!! He has a weekly assignment book that translates into 1.5 hours of homework a day - including weekends. He has a 10 word spelling test every Friday. His strong point is currently math where he is doing basic addition and subtraction with little effort.

I find this amazing given that we were learning the ABC's in first grade back in 66.

[12own911]

Originally posted by dmoolenaar
What kills me today are the demands and expectations put on little guys and girls these days. My son is behind the curve on speach and language yet he has basic reading and writing skills - in first grade!! He has a weekly assignment book that translates into 1.5 hours of homework a day - including weekends. He has a 10 word spelling test every Friday. His strong point is currently math where he is doing basic addition and subtraction with little effort.

I find this amazing given that we were learning the ABC's in first grade back in 66.

Has your son been tested for Aspergers (sp?) syndrome or one of those other syndromes? Just curious? One of the symptons is bad speech/language skills but high scores for reading/writing and math.

[JavaBrewer]

Originally posted by RickM
A friend recently described his frustration on how the school wasn't teaching his six year old son values and pushing him to read better

I would be more concerned that the school was TRYING to teach values. Which values? Whose values, my values? Do I have a say in these values? What if they don't align with my values? Values like what - "There are no losers", "Competition is bad"?

Sedation - hey I'm all for it (wine most nights) but not for my kids. Well, they get a sip every now and then. Society as a whole puts up with it on all levels, actually I think it encourages it. Years ago my wife was working fulltime and wanted to start a family. She was unhappy. Very unhappy - something about a clock that was ticking... Anyway, she went to a doctor for her annual physical and came out 30 minutes later with a perscription for anti-depressants. Yeah right. We tossed that perscription and never went back to that QUACK. Instead, we made changes in our life, drank some more wine, and bang kids were arriving

Meds are a good thing, but they have their proper place. Use some common sense folks.