http://www.post-gazette.com/headlines/20010408zerotolerance3.asp
As if we needed any further proof…
This is idiotic.
Does anybody compile examples of, “Zero-Tollerance Gone Wrong?”
How 'bout this one?
http://webserv5.startribune.com/stOnLine/cgi-bin/article?thisSlug=KNIF24&date=24-May-2001&word=knife
This kid was suspended for 20 weeks? Can this be verified?
I haven’t lived in the US since the zero tolerance policy was initiated, so excuse my ignorance. But isn’t zero tolerance a bit like free speech and freedom of religion in that the whole reason is to be clearly black and white? That is, a kid does the right thing, but it contravenes zero tolerance. He gets a pat on the back and a day off in return for taking the subjectiveness out of who gets suspended and who doesn’t. Certainly, where I grew up in the 1970’s, suspension was based on your grades and parents standing in a small community. [Anyway, this is the pit so I guess I should start a new thread in general questions]
Try these:
The Civil Rights Project, Harvard University
Zero Tolerance Nightmares
I wrote a paper that addressed this problem in relation to teenage drug use for a class on adolescence. These links were among my sources. I argued that schools use zero tolerance so that they don’t have to think too hard about individual cases (in proper academic language of course). If anyone is interested, and if the mods don’t mind, I can post the paper (it’s about 950 words).
Oh yeah. This is how we encourage kids to help their friends.
“Remember, children, it’s better to let your pal slice his wrists open than to have a weapon in your locker!”
I don’t have much sympathy for the kid in this case, he should have turned it in to a teacher or some other authority figure immediately. For all we know he could have just made the story up about taking the knife from a suicidal friend when he was busted with a knife in his locker.
I saw the article about Ratner when it first came out. While there’s no question that he used bad judgement, if I remember the article correctly, he didn’t know what to do with the knife. He was afraid of giving it to the school because his friend might have gotten in trouble, so he was going to take it home that day and ask his mom. The suicidal friend was real…there were student witnesses to the incident, and the friend admitted she brought the knife in to kill herself.
Oh come one Badtz, this kind of thing is happening all the time now. Well, maybe not all the time, but enough of the time that it makes you wonder about that kind of policy.
Only a couple of weeks ago I heard a story of a kid that was suspended for pointing a chicken finger at his teacher and saying, “Bang!”. Did that kid need suspension? Under that schools no tolerance policy the kid was suspended.
I’m not picking on you Badtz, but do you really believe a policy of “No Tolerance” at all cost and under all circumstances is effective and wise?
If what was written is actually true, that the kid was trying to stop a friends suicide and took the knife and held on to it in his locker, do you really believe he should be suspended?
Under zero tolerance, taking the knife to a teacher would have also been big trouble for him. After all, he would have to be in possession of the knife to take it to a teacher.
Even if there is a suspicion that he made up the story, he deserves the benefit of the doubt because holding on to the knife would be the most reasonable course of action under the circumstances, the only other option being turning the knife in and risking arrest, suspension, and possibly not graduating.
IMOSHO…
“No Tolerance” = “No Intelligence”
Further… isn’t it ironic that the people who most often preach for tolerance are the same people who have brought about the creation of the “No Tolerance” policy?
Here’s more, from About.com:
The Zero-Tolerance Follies
Zero Times Three: Three New Articles About Zero-Tolerance
New Jersey seems to show up way too often there. :sigh:
[Lionel Hutz]
“There’s tolerance…and then there’s tolerance!”
[/Lionel Hutz]
I’d say you’ve nailed it dead on.
NEWS FLASH
Sturmhauke has been suspended from the SDMB indefinitely for making comments which may be construed as “terroristic threats”, according to a source who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution by sturmhauke. “You just can’t be too careful these days. He might have been able to electrocute me through my Internet connection.”
Has anyone read Chiques link yet?
A kitchen knife in the car? (on school property… but seriously)
It’s for the good of the children!
I guess we’ll never know what would happen if he immediately took the knife to an authority figure and explained the situation, because he instead kept it in his locker. This was a dumb course of action even if his story is true. He should have known that holding on to the knife would get him in trouble.
I can’t find much about the circumstances behind this in any of these stories (most of which seem biased). Did this supposed suicide attempt take place on school property? Was there an attempt, or was it a case of a friend saying ‘I think I’m going to kill myself’ and his friend saying ‘Give me your knife so you won’t do anything stupid’? In that case the best course of action would have been to tell a teacher or somebody that his friend had a knife and was talking about killing himself. If there was an actual interrupted attempt, he should have immediately found a teacher and gave them the knife (I’m sure in that case there would not have been as big an issue). Even if there was no knife involved at all a true friend would have told someone about his friend’s suicidal thoughts and/or actions.
I’m not for zero-tolerance policies. The stories about people getting in trouble for plastic knives or drawings of weapons piss me off too. But in this case we are talking about a real, potentially dangerous weapon that this student put in his locker at school. If we are going to have zero-tolerance policies, we need to at least enforce them fairly, and in this case I believe that was done. If they let this kid slide, even if he was telling the truth the same excuse would be used by other kids caught with weapons. The kid made a big mistake and now he’s paying for it.
Badtz, that’s my point. If zero tolerance weren’t so brain dead, the “I was afraid to turn in the knife for fear of getting in trouble” excuse simply wouldn’t exist. It’s not his fault that other students can use the same excuse for nefarious purposes. It’s the fault of the school board for creating this no-win situation.
And why wouldn’t he assume that having possession of a knife, regardless of the excuse, would mean suspension or worse? After all, doesn’t zero tolerance mean no exceptions? Given the choice of hoping the administration will smile upon me and violate its own zero tolerance policy, or stashing the thing until I can take it home to my parents, I know which one I’d choose.
I think we need to know stuff like (1) what was the nature of the suicide situation, (2) where was the student when he took the knife from his friend and (3) how long did he have it in his locker before he got busted with it.
Wait a minute, I just did a search on “Ben Ratner” and knife and found this:
The kid obviously kept her knife long enough for the girl he took it from to tell other kids about it and for it to get back to the school officials. It’s not like he snatched the knife from her hands as she was about to harm herself - he was passed a note which he should have immediately given to his teacher. I’m not sure why his suspension was extended from 10 days to a full semester, perhaps the officials learned more details about the situation after the original decision.
As is stated in the article linked to by Badtz Maru, the boy thought attention from the school officials would have been too distressing for her, which is a logical assumption to make. She probably would have gotten suspended instead of the help she was crying out for. Having been in a similar position myself, I can tell you that the last people I would have gone to would be school officials. My first thought would be to make sure the person was safe and to tell people close to her, family and/or close friends.
No. “Zero Tolerance” = “Cowardice.”
Let’s be frank; Zero Tolerance is a chickenshit way of avoiding responsibility. Rather than asking principals and teachers to use common sense and good judgement based on a solid foundation of rules and an understanding of both the letter AND spirit of the rules, we use “Zero tolerance” to try to make all decisions on paper. That means that school staff can never be held responsible for the consequences of their judgement, because they have no judgements to make.
Of course, the result of trying to make decisions ahead of time without regard to the specific details ov every situation is the idiocy we see referred to in this thread.
In a “Zero tolerance” school I don’t even understand why you’d need a principal.