In my town, there has been a fair amount of hubbub recently regarding an incident where a middle-schooler brought an Airsoft pistol onto the bus and into the school.
A fellow student took the pistol away and the Principal was eventually informed, whereupon he confiscated the pistol, and suspended the student.
So, dear Dopers, IYHO, did the Principal act correctly? What do you think the correct response should have been?
Speaking as a person who once brought a spring loaded pellet pistol to school as part of a Halloween costume, I’m feeling that the punishment was reasonable, given the new reality of school security concerns.
Now, this happened a week ago, and since then… The principal has resigned. He failed to follow “gun” protocol which would have involved putting the school on lockdown and calling the Police immediately.
The principle’s initial response seems appropriate to me. The subsequent event is ridiculous.
The initial response seems appropriate and proportional. You can’t bring that sort of thing to school both because it’s a nuisance and because it’s liable to provoke a panic. However, you really can’t kill someone with an airsoft gun and you can’t even hurt them badly except by the worst of luck or the absolute worst of intentions, which this kid presumably didn’t have. A couple days of suspension seems about right.
Exactly, appleciders. So why did the Principal feel compelled to resign, when his actions were fine? There was no reason to activate the “gun protocol” since no actual gun was involved in the incident, yet his resignation implies this was a terrible failure of judgment. Have we as a people really become that hysterical?
I agree with everyone in this thread. Let’s hug!
There were complaints, initially from a representative of the Teacher’s Association that there wasn’t adequate communication of the events. Then, honestly, it just seemed to be a lot of hand wringing about failure to follow “protocol”, a few letters from the School main office regarding the Principal being suspended during the “investigation” then the article in today’s paper about his resignation.
However, I am currently looking at a photo of the superintendent standing in front of 150 “concerned” residents at a meeting organized by the school’s Parent Action Team (whatever that is).
Did the principal know it was an airsoft gun when he went to get it from the student? Or was he told that someone had a gun and went to go investigate it without locking the school down? Because in that case he certainly should have followed procedures.
It seems hard to imagine he’d try to confiscate the item if he wasn’t sure whether or not it was a real firearm. That would be a great way to get killed, and most people aren’t suicidal (or that brave).
But, yes, it changes things a bit if it wasn’t clear at the time of the Principal’s actions what type of pistol was involved.
You won’t find any reason when it comes to guns in schools. Anything gun-shaped or gun related is suspect these days. Schools, or maybe mostly parents, are way over-sensitive. There’s the story of the kid who made his pastry into the shape of a gun and got in trouble, the kid who wore a t-shirt with a gun on it and was asked to turn it inside out, and even kids getting into trouble for using their fingers as guns.
A couple of days suspension would be the most the student should face. Whatever moron who came up with the idea of a lockdown over a toy should be fired and then deported. Can you imagine the chaos involved in triggering a lockdown? This would cause an unnecessary panic among parents along with an interruption of commerce as they leave their jobs early to pick their kids up.
[Don Lafontaine voice] In a Zero-Tolerance world where grade school students get suspended for making finger guns or biting their bologna sandwich into a shape resembling a pistol, one brave Principal makes a stand for common sense… [/DLv]