Yes, it’s a real problem. School rules and criminal laws need to be written so there is no room for misunderstandings or interpretation by cops who are expected to “tell the difference.” Something is either against the rules or it is not. If it is okay for a kid to be at my house while I’m drinking, what is the rule that says it’s not okay for that kid to be at my house while my 16 year old is drinking? I think we’re back to a rule that prohibits being around others who are committing a crime. Such a rule can be written, but it’s a bad rule. IMO.
Beep the horn. There were twenty seven people in the house. It’s not like finder her friend and bringing her out was a herculean task.
Nothing. I’m fine with how this whole thing played out.
If I were the school administrator, I might have given her a break, given that she was just picking up her friend. This could have gone either way.
But am I outraged that they decided to be strict with her? No. It’s four volleyball games.
She didn’t have a party with alcohol. Thus she did not do the first.
This is all in theory, though. You don’t have any actual examples of this sort of confusion on the part of the cops?
This is bringing semantic nitpicking to a whole new level.
There’s wrong, then there’s wrong.
Look, let’s say you play Trivial Pursuit, and the question is “Who invaded Spain in the 8th Century?”. You answer The Moors, and the guy says “Nope, that’s wrong, the answer is ‘The Moops’”
According to The Rules your answer has to match the answer on the back of the card, so your answer is “wrong”. However, in reality, The Moops did not invade Spain, The Moors did, so your answer is “not wrong”.
According to The Rules, she may have done the “wrong” thing by trying to give her friend a ride home. However, in reality, she was doing something “not wrong” she was doing a good deed by helping her friend get home safely.
She deserves a suspension every bit as much as Spain deserved getting invaded by The Moops.
Updated article on the story from the Boston Globe.
Some new facts. The rules in question are the “Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association rules pertaining to student-athletes” if anyone feels like Googling them.
Also this article states that she had trouble convincing her friend to leave which is why she was still there when the cops showed up.
Makes sense.
Interesting. So many schools have policies like North Andover’s that prohibit being around drinking at all that they address this in the rules:
So they leave it open for schools to have more leeway than N Andover does. But my experience with parents is that most schools take the hard line approach.
Has someone suggested that this is an extremely rare policy to have? You keep rebutting that suggestion that I think no one has made. The argument is that it’s a stupid policy, not that’s its an uncommon one. Obviously, the MIAA even had the good sense not to try to punish teens for being around other teens who are drinking–much less punish them for any period of time in the presence of alcohol.
Handbook.(PDF)
ETA:So you found out you were wrong.
No, it’s more like this: there’s a policy that it’s against the rules to have a company pen outside the office. Joe is a bit lazy about this and puts a pen in his pocket and is walking out to his car. Jane realizes this, chases after him, points out that he has a pen, takes it, and starts walking back towards the office, holding that pen, so she can return it. Then the boss comes out, sees Jane holding a pen outside the office, and fines her.
The confusion, which is entirely on your end, it seems, is whether her being there was “wrong.” According to the cops (representing the state of Massachusetts) she did nothing wrong. Her parents, who are filing a lawsuit over this, think she did nothing wrong. The school is on a completely different page. How do you not see this?
I know it seems that way to you, but when you are laboring in the Marianas trench of debate skills, everything looks like up.
Thanks.
My point was that the school and the cops and the girl are all on the same page about the facts of the matter. No one denies that she was there.
Of course they disagree about how “wrong” her actions were.
That’s not at all what you were arguing one whole page ago:
Now you seem to be agreeing with me that the cops are, in fact, saying that it’s OK to be at a party where alcohol is present. Which is inconsistent with the school.
The school is the only entity here with a policy against being around booze, and the policy is poorly written and incoherently enforced. The punishment meted out here does not jive with the policy as written; you seem to be arguing that the girl should have known what the unwritten policy was because “everyone’s on the same page” or something, but that’s clearly not the case.
What was I “wrong” about? The school administrator mentioned the rules of the MIAA, and I didn’t know what they were. So I found them and added them to the thread. You know, fighting ignorance and all that.
I will say that it does appear a bit weasel-like on the part of the school to point to those rules as if their hands are tied when in fact the rules state that the school does have discretion here. But it’s still the school’s call. Every school seems to have similar rules. If you are at a party where minors are drinking, even if you didn’t drink yourself, you can get suspended from sports. All the kids know this. The MIAA doesn’t insist on this, but they don’t have a rule against it either. It sounds like schools just want to err on the side of caution, and I can’t say I blame them.
I certainly don’t see many PTA types lobbying the schools for the right of their kids to attend keg parties as long as they aren’t drinking. But that’s just my opinion.
If this is true, why did the cops write up summonses for the 15 kids who weren’t drinking?
Also, is it your claim the the girl didn’t know about the policy at all? I’ll need a cite for that, please.
Because when it comes to underage drinking it’s guilty until proven innocent. And I get that – bunch of kids set their beers down as soon as they see flashing lights and then they’re not longer in “possession,” so the cops just assume that everyone was holding a beer. It’s bullshit, but despite this dumb policy they still didn’t get the conviction to stick for the girl in question. That says something, doesn’t it?
I dunno, she could have memorized the damn policy for all I know. The policy doesn’t forbid her actions, so it only helps her case if she did know about it.
What “conviction”? You seem to be bringing in a lot of baggage to this that didn’t actually occur. She wasn’t convicted of anything because she wasn’t on trial. She was given a simple summons like everyone else at the party for possession of alcohol.
You make it sound like the cops were out to get her and failed, or something. That isn’t what happened.
You certainly seemed to be implying that she didn’t know the policy or was somehow confused about it. She knew the rules. She should have picked her friend up at the street. Her friend is actually the jerk here. She seems to have gotten drunk, called for a ride, then refused to leave with her ride thus getting her sober friend in trouble.
SciFiSam:
Alternatively, she could have called an adult to pick her up rather than one of her underaged buddies.