If a kid brings scissors, or a steak knife, or some other sharp “forbidden” instrument of destruction from home to school in their bookbag, and evidently (to you) has no malicious intent, why can’t you just put it in your desk and send a note home to his or her parents to come get it? Is calling the police absolutely mandatory when (it seems) a little judicious common sense could solve these problems without calling the police?
Don’t teachers and adminstrators have some power in these scenarios?
This varies a great deal from district to district: it’s hard to find uniform policies within districts, let alone on a state or national level.
That said, it’s worth noting that you never hear of the cases where teachers DO excercise their judgement and do not escalate things.
It’s also worth noting that in your average, horribly over crowded school, NOTHING is really private, and so if a teacher decides to ignore school policy, it is with the knowledge that the administration will hear about it from 4 students, 2 parents, and a janitor by lunch. Cram 1900 students in a building designed form 1200, and privacy is gone.
A zero tolerance policy is in place because the school board wants zero tolerance. This is generally because, somewhere along the line, a first-grader went after another first-grader with a pair of paper scissors, or a middle-school student tried to stab another one with a nail file. Do teachers and administrators have some power in these scenarios? No, because that’s what zero tolerance means.
In most schools, teachers know better than to put anything of any value (or potential harm) in their desks, even their locked desks. It’s like putting a gift-wrapped box in the back seat of a car in the worst neighborhood in town.
I have a BA in Fine Arts, but a goddamn PHD in CYA. Ah, how educators love their little acronyms. Cover your ass. I think zero tolerance is idiotic in some cases, but I don’t dare ignore it. A couple of times, early on in my career, I’ve tried to act like a normal human being toward people I thought were also normal human beings, and got horribly burnt.
Last year, one of my students was working on a papier mache sculpture of a monster/alien. Most kids love this project and this particular student was doing a fantastic job. It was nearly seven feet tall, multiple tentacles (with serrated suckers!) and in one of those tentacles it was to carry a space ray gun. Totally cartoon-like, 1920’s style dealy. He took it home to work on it over the week end and brought it back on monday in his backpack. When he went to get his english lit text the ray gun had to come out first and the teacher spotted it. And yes, because of zero tolerance the kid was suspended for nearly a week while they investigated the ‘zero tolerance implications’ of the situation.
Most of us would roll our eyes at such a ridiculous situation. But I’ve been teaching for a while and I have to reluctantly agree that the teacher did the right thing. If you have any doubts, any inkling, that something might in the slightest, be just a little off, it’s better to be safe than sorry. Cover your ass.
Is it not enough to sit down and discuss the situation before suspending the student? Surely, you are allowed to exercise common sense, for crying out loud?
(ivylass, who has her kids in private school, and God willing, will keep them there…)
CYA all the way. One of our counsellors saw a kid with a Leatherman on his belt at a football game and didn’t call security immediately and failed to report the kid to the Administration. As a result, he was placed under “close supervision” for a year and just about lost his credential. We really have no choice in the matter - the laws are such that “failure to report” is as great a crime as “possession of contraband.”