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What the hell is wrong with the Northeastern USA?

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/2nd-grader-suspended-over-imaginary-grenade-224740937.html

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/fifth-grader-reprimanded-bringing-paper-gun-school-181022936.html

http://news.yahoo.com/kindergartener-suspended-making-terroristic-threat-hello-kitty-bubble-205930852.html

http://dailycaller.com/2013/01/03/maryland-school-suspends-six-year-old-boy-for-making-gun-gesture-saying-pow/

It's very disappointing that we have these examples of complete idiocy and lack of thought in places that are supposed to be institutions of learning.

What is a suspension supposed to teach a kindergartner or young elementary school student? You'd probably make a bigger impression by making them stay inside for recess that day. In these cases even that would probably be an overreaction.

That was weird...
Those stories are just odd.
Odd reaction to an odd situation...

Zero tolerance nonsense.

 sebster wrote:
Zero tolerance nonsense.

Exactly. Just an excuse for teachers and administrators to not have to actually use their brains and make an actual decision on what kind of discipline is appropriate.

I don't see how discipline is warranted in any of these cases.

What a load of hippy nonsense. Young boys play at war, it's what they do. Give 2 young lands sticks and I guarantee they will be pretend sword fighting within minutes.

I’m glad these idiots weren’t in charge when I was at school.

Actually, i think that these are cases of weak/poor parenting..

To explain further, when my younger brother was 6, his school attempted to suspend him (and incidentally, some of his friends) because they were playing cops and robbers, and were using 'finger guns'. I say attempted, because my parents basically said, no, he is a boy and boys play games like this and there is absolutely nothing wrong with games at his age, and that he would be in class because there was no suspendable offense done.

These were the same 'educators' who thought that he had add because he was disruptive to the class....again, he was a 6-7 year old boy, who also happened to be learning to play drums.


To me, it is a sad state of affairs when kids can no longer be kids, and we do not allow them to learn real life lessons their own way.

Seriously? Shouting at children for feth all?

Sigh.

AMERICA! FETH YEAH!


As someone that spent 5 years learning the 'greatness" of the American education system, I can certainly tell you that these schools are within their rights to act as they did. They are COMPLETE fethwads for not using this as a teachable moment, showing the young kids the differences between school and play time, when playing at war is appropriate, and when it is not. You have a 6 year old sit in from recess, and just talk with him about why bringing telling a kid that you're going to shoot them and then yourself (Terrorist with Hello Kitty gun) is wrong, explain that some very bad men have come in to schools and have done that to little kids his or her age. Explain to them that you understand youngin's like to play war, cops and robbers, cowboys and indians, what have you, but they need to remember school is not the place for this.

BAM! Just helped a kid be a better person.

*sigh* School districts and their 0 tolerance policies make me ill. I had a friend get suspended for 2 days in 7th grade because he made a comment about the principal being flat chested, and some little tattle-tale told her. And said that he violated the school's 0 tolerance harassment policy.

When I was in the 3rd grade I almost got suspended for having a spork in my pocket.

The best part? I got the spork from the school cafeteria.

The above story in 100% true

Quick sue parents are just as much to blame for zero-tolerance policies as schools are.

 d-usa wrote:
Quick sue parents are just as much to blame for zero-tolerance policies as schools are.

*sigh*... yes, yes they are...

 d-usa wrote:
Quick sue parents are just as much to blame for zero-tolerance policies as schools are.

Agreed, this horrible litigious culture has started to make its way over here as well and it's not pretty.

 d-usa wrote:
Quick sue parents are just as much to blame for zero-tolerance policies as schools are.

That seems like it'd be walking a fine line. I'd think parents could just as easily bring a suit against a school for one of these stupid zero tolerance policy incidents (not that it would necessarily be successful).

 Breotan wrote:
What the hell is wrong with the Northeastern USA?

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/2nd-grader-suspended-over-imaginary-grenade-224740937.html

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/fifth-grader-reprimanded-bringing-paper-gun-school-181022936.html

http://news.yahoo.com/kindergartener-suspended-making-terroristic-threat-hello-kitty-bubble-205930852.html

http://dailycaller.com/2013/01/03/maryland-school-suspends-six-year-old-boy-for-making-gun-gesture-saying-pow/

Is this the thread where we pretend zero tolerance policies only exist in the northeastern US? Because, you know, even 10 seconds of googling reveals this obviously isn't even slightly true. I mean, you can put in nearly any state in the country and add "zero tolerance school" to get your states stupid stories. So we could either have an honest dialogue about why zero tolerance is stupid, or we could pretend it's simply a regional problem because thinking is difficult.

PS: Pro-tip: "Colorado" isn't considered to be in the Northeastern US, which is where the very first link you dropped happened.

 LuciusAR wrote:
What a load of hippy nonsense. Young boys play at war, it's what they do. Give 2 young lands sticks and I guarantee they will be pretend sword fighting within minutes.

I’m glad these idiots weren’t in charge when I was at school.

This, many a grand battle in the fantasy/medieval setting, and many others in more modern times were fought in my neighborhood with sticks! The most versatile battle implement known to man! Also ironically one of our first ACTUAL battle implements.

Then again I was a terror in school and was tossed out of a private catholic institution with enough demerit slips to wallpaper a mid-size room.

 LuciusAR wrote:
What a load of hippy nonsense. Young boys play at war, it's what they do. Give 2 young lands sticks and I guarantee they will be pretend sword fighting within minutes.

I’m glad these idiots weren’t in charge when I was at school.

While I agree that the school is overacting in one of these( it didnt read the other) If you have two kids playing with sticks hitting eachother on the playground, and one get poked in the eye, the school can hear from parents real soon. Its better safe then sorry.
I think its like this with zero-tolerance. They be extra careful because parents like to complain to schools alot.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:

 LuciusAR wrote:
What a load of hippy nonsense. Young boys play at war, it's what they do. Give 2 young lands sticks and I guarantee they will be pretend sword fighting within minutes.

I’m glad these idiots weren’t in charge when I was at school.

While I agree that the school is overacting in one of these( it didnt read the other) If you have two kids playing with sticks hitting eachother on the playground, and one get poked in the eye, the school can hear from parents real soon. Its better safe then sorry.
I think its like this with zero-tolerance. They be extra careful because parents like to complain to schools alot.

Just read the links, no one is hitting another with sticks. It was an example of "boys will be boys".

Oh I agree, I just think it was a poor example, because unlike the stories given, Baning stick can result in injury.

If two elementary school kids are "sword fighting" on the playground, just take the sticks away and make them go inside or miss the next recess or something. You don't need to suspend them, that's pretty much completely meaningless to a kid that age.

 Hordini wrote:
You don't need to suspend them, that's pretty much completely meaningless to a kid that age.

Talk about positive conditioning

 LordofHats wrote:

 Hordini wrote:
You don't need to suspend them, that's pretty much completely meaningless to a kid that age.

Talk about positive conditioning

Yeah, exactly. I can just imagine the thought process of my kindergarten-age self after an incident like that:

"Oh, I get to stay home all day after having an epic sword fight on the playground?! YES!!! We should do this again sometime."

Nah, you only think that as an adult. In my experience kids that age (kindergarten etc) love going to school.

it is a problem of parenting and the overreach of zero tolerance policies. If the parents were doing their jobs, ie keeping the toy guns at home, the teachers wouldn't be doing it for them, ie massive punishments for pointing at each other and saying bang.

The lack of parental guidance has turned into school-assisted parenting. Two boys, on their own, will most likely play war or cops and robbers; this is normal. But because no one coaches the kids as to how to behave, schools end up filling the gap. Because teachers can't really inflict a parental level of punishment (like a good ass-whipping), zero tolerance became the norm.

Let the parents raise the kids. Let the schools do the educating. Unless a kid is a threat or an actual disturbance, neither the twain should mix. Parents and teachers need to talk, but teachers are not in the parenting business from 9 to 5 on the clock.

 Ouze wrote:
Nah, you only think that as an adult. In my experience kids that age (kindergarten etc) love going to school.

Kindergarten and 1st grade Alfndrate would have to agree with you, I thoroughly enjoyed school, it was 2nd through 8th grade that I dreaded, and I enjoyed the "social" aspects of high school, though most of the classes were boring. But I blame my disdain for grade school (private catholic school) on the fact that in 2nd grade one of my best friends moved away, I got into a fight because 4 classmates were calling me by my last name mockingly by making pig calling sounds (while I am a larger person now, I was far from a tubby little fat kid then), and I was being constantly bullied by a 4th grader for the next two years (who ended that fight in 2nd grade when he practically gave me a concussion when he pushed me down on the parking lot of the school). The results of this fight? The antagonists got off scot-free and I got recess taken away from me for a week as well as a parent-teacher meeting explaining all of this because I had "started" a fight. And the torment only ended when we all graduated, and the boys were split amongst 2 catholic high schools and after freshman year, I entered the illustrious American Public Education system.

 Ouze wrote:
Nah, you only think that as an adult. In my experience kids that age (kindergarten etc) love going to school.

You're right, they do and I did too. But I liked having days off as well. We had some awesome snow days and things like that. If I had actually been suspended in elementary the biggest factor would have really been whether or not I was in trouble with my parents. If it was for a stupid reason like some of these examples, I probably wouldn't have been.

In other news, children all over the world started to pretend to have guns.

 Hordini wrote:
If two elementary school kids are "sword fighting" on the playground, just take the sticks away and make them go inside or miss the next recess or something. You don't need to suspend them, that's pretty much completely meaningless to a kid of any age.

This seems more fitting. Suspending kids IMO is a counter productive punishment. I would assert that in most cases the kid in question wouldn't give 2 feths about missing school. It means they get to stay home and play video games, so really this just reinforces bad behavior.

Suspension is only a punishment to a child thats wants to learn, which I would also argue is very rare in a child under the age of 12. Many kids don't hate school, but neither do they like it to the point where being deprived of it would be a punishment.


This action should only be taken in events where the kid in question is actually disruptive/harmful to the education of the other children and/or it would be an actual punishment for the kid.

I think you are all somewhat unaware as to the purpose of a suspension. The punishment doesn't come from the having missed a day of school. The reason a child is suspended is because the punishment the Teachers/Principals deem suitable to the offence is too severe for them to legally administer, and thus the expectation is that when you get home your parents will administer said punishment. Colloquially known as, "a good old fashioned ass whoopin."

Unfortunately, most parents no longer believe in the benefits of said ass whoopin, so the punishment goes undelivered. I, however, had the good grace to be born into a family which did and does still recognize the educational benefit of an ass whoopin, and thus suspensions where the thing I feared the most when it came to disciplinary action by the school.