SC Student Reinstated

[chasfm11]

http://www.wltx.com/news/article/219320 ... -to-School
WLTX.COM
Tony Santaella
8:21 PM, Jan 31, 2013

Sumter, SC (WLTX) - A six-year-old girl expelled for bringing a clear plastic gun to class will be allowed to return to school.

This one really stuck in my craw. The little girl brought her brother's Airsoft gun to school for show and tell. It is the kind of mistake I would expect a 6 year old to make. The school called the parents and expelled her. Not suspended - expelled. I get the "zero tolerance" policy on look-alike weapons in school but expulsion at 6 years old seems more than heavy handed.

The article says

Since then, the story's received statewide and even national attention. According to the district, school administrators and teacher had received threats over the decision.

I do not condone in anyway threatening school officials. Breaking the law is breaking the law. And two wrongs don't make a right.
But a part of me wonders if anything short of this kind of a public response would have brought about the reconsideration.

Here is my real point. The Gun Banners keep asking for compromise. Why won't we compromise? And then an incident like this occurs. Where is the compromise? Is zero tolerance really zero tolerance at 6 years old? My blood boils when I think about situations like this one when I read about our justice system offering great leniency to adult offenders who had terrible childhoods. The school has just given this child a terrible childhood and judged her far more harshly than judges seem to do to repeat offenders for more serious offenses.

I would like to feel sorry for the superintendent and the school board. I don't.

P.S. A 10 time repeat offender pawned the stereo that was ripped out of our daughter's car in her apartment parking lot. It was one of 76 similar stereos that he sold to pawn shops. He received no punishment. Our daughter ended up paying her $500 deductible and being without her car for 4 days while the $1,800 repair was made. Hers was one of the lessor cost situations among the 76.

[67SS]

these over the top knee jerk reactionary people irk me to no end...

[i8godzilla]

Our (non-)educators are really out of control. Zero Tolerance is for those that do not have the ability to make decisions.

Let's see we have kids suspended/expelled for:

Eating a pizza into a gun shape
Using their fingers to mimic a gun
A torn piece of paper
Hello Kitty bubble maker

Although not gun related, there are first and second graders expelled/suspended for sexual harassment. ARGGGGGGGGG!

And one of my biggest gripes: Chicago school teachers going on strike because they do not want performance based measures tied to any compensation.

[chasfm11]

I sent them a rather scathing and contemptuous message on their school contact-page; I'm glad she's able to return to school, but I wonder what effect this will have on her.

It is hard to say but most 6 year olds are very vulnerable. I was student teaching and had a little girl in one of my kindgergarden classes interrupting the class with talking after I quietly asked her not to several times. Without further comment, I moved her desk off to the side and she was heart-broken, sobbing incessantly.

My biggest fear for this child is the environment that she could face when she returns. Some of her class will likely try to make fun of her. If the school is not as quick to sit on those bullies as they were to condemn her, she will be traumatized. The little girl in Phila with the paper torn in an "L" to look like a gun was reportedly sent to a different school. Up-rooting a child at that age from her friends is a life changing experience.

[VMI77]

I sent them a rather scathing and contemptuous message on their school contact-page; I'm glad she's able to return to school, but I wonder what effect this will have on her.

It is hard to say but most 6 year olds are very vulnerable. I was student teaching and had a little girl in one of my kindgergarden classes interrupting the class with talking after I quietly asked her not to several times. Without further comment, I moved her desk off to the side and she was heart-broken, sobbing incessantly.

My biggest fear for this child is the environment that she could face when she returns. Some of her class will likely try to make fun of her. If the school is not as quick to sit on those bullies as they were to condemn her, she will be traumatized. The little girl in Phila with the paper torn in an "L" to look like a gun was reportedly sent to a different school. Up-rooting a child at that age from her friends is a life changing experience.

The best thing that could possibly happen to this, or any other little girl, or boy, would be for the school to ban them from attendance, so that they have to be homeschooled. It shouldn't separate her from her friends, she just won't see them at school.

[Dragonfighter]

Since then, the story's received statewide and even national attention. According to the district, school administrators and teacher had received threats over the decision.

I do not condone in anyway threatening school officials. Breaking the law is breaking the law. And two wrongs don't make a right.
But a part of me wonders if anything short of this kind of a public response would have brought about the reconsideration.

I noticed it didn't say what kind of "threats". Was it, "We will trow the lot of you out in the next board election,"? I think the "threats"were along the lines of legal repercussions and such or they would have said, "We received death threats." Using the word "threats" sounds more ominous than saying "we were sent notices of pending legal action," or "we were warned of the political ramifications by parent organizations". This allows the school board to say, "Poor us, we were threatened."

Now I don't know and am totally speculating, but if it were truly threats to their personal safety, the press would have been all over that.

[chasfm11]

I sent them a rather scathing and contemptuous message on their school contact-page; I'm glad she's able to return to school, but I wonder what effect this will have on her.

It is hard to say but most 6 year olds are very vulnerable. I was student teaching and had a little girl in one of my kindgergarden classes interrupting the class with talking after I quietly asked her not to several times. Without further comment, I moved her desk off to the side and she was heart-broken, sobbing incessantly.

My biggest fear for this child is the environment that she could face when she returns. Some of her class will likely try to make fun of her. If the school is not as quick to sit on those bullies as they were to condemn her, she will be traumatized. The little girl in Phila with the paper torn in an "L" to look like a gun was reportedly sent to a different school. Up-rooting a child at that age from her friends is a life changing experience.

The best thing that could possibly happen to this, or any other little girl, or boy, would be for the school to ban them from attendance, so that they have to be homeschooled. It shouldn't separate her from her friends, she just won't see them at school.

I understand your point and agree with part of it. A parent making a conscious decision to homeschool a child is a wonderful thing in my view. Under a voluntary condition, arrangements can easily be made to have the child have contacts with their friends. In an involuntary separation as this one was, it can take a lot of work with the child to prevent them from blaming themselves from a separation. In the case of the little girl in Phila, the parents couldn't even bring the child in a car to the school grounds to pick up siblings. I suspect that this situation was not treated as an innocuous one regarding classmates and friends. The stigma that the school has assigned to the girl will make it very hard for her. There are always bullies and they only have to smell a little blood in order to capitalize on a situation like this.

It is all about how you get to homeschool, at least for me. Recovery is possible but it may take a long time.

[chasfm11]

Since then, the story's received statewide and even national attention. According to the district, school administrators and teacher had received threats over the decision.

I do not condone in anyway threatening school officials. Breaking the law is breaking the law. And two wrongs don't make a right.
But a part of me wonders if anything short of this kind of a public response would have brought about the reconsideration.

I noticed it didn't say what kind of "threats". Was it, "We will trow the lot of you out in the next board election,"? I think the "threats"were along the lines of legal repercussions and such or they would have said, "We received death threats." Using the word "threats" sounds more ominous than saying "we were sent notices of pending legal action," or "we were warned of the political ramifications by parent organizations". This allows the school board to say, "Poor us, we were threatened."

Now I don't know and am totally speculating, but if it were truly threats to their personal safety, the press would have been all over that.

You may be right. The school spokesperson seemed to imply that the threats would be turned over to legal authorities and I may be reading more into them that they warrant. I'm sure that the school officials are pandering to the press to try to recover some of the credibility that they lost over their stupidity and then the reversal of it. There always seem to be a small minority, however, who take their disgust for a situation like this a little too far. Somehow, the rest of us who disgusted with the schools actions are asked to atone for that excess of those few. I don't accept that.

Many of this country's leaders have chosen to do all that they can to polarize the population over the gun issue. When organizations, commercial or public, weigh into that issue through their actions, they should be willing to accept the consequences of that polarization. I didn't create the extremes on either side of it and I'm not willing to accept the blame for them. This was an absolutely vial punishment of a little girl who cannot possibly understand all of the complex aspects of her action. The superintendent and the school board acted in a way to bring out the extremes of that polarization. They need to put on their big boy pants and deal with it. Zero tolerance is a two way street.