Well, I don’t know the situation and I’m not a parent, so I’m just going off of what my parents would have done. I was an emotionally fragile child as well; we moved a lot and I got picked on a lot. The best thing they ever did for me was to teach me to face unpleasantness and keep moving forward. But, I feel sure that you know what is best for your child and I just wanted to add my two cents.
I was picked on as a child, too. In fact I didn’t really have anyone who I would truly consider a friend until I was in 8th grade. I was a total loner and very emotionally screwed up (woohoo bipolar). Normally I do encourage him to face things. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had conversations with him about how he shouldn’t let teasing bother him because you’re giving the teasers exactly what they want. If you don’t react and get upset they will eventually stop (I gave the example of dangling string in front of a cat. It gets boring very quickly if the cat doesn’t bat at it.) I’ve talked to him about the idea of some people’s opinions not being worth getting upset over. Do you want to be friends with Bobby? Is he someone you think would be fun to hang around? No? Then why do you care if he thinks you’re [fill in the insult-du-jour]. I’ve tried to teach him techniques for dealing with various situations that come up at school. This, however, isn’t that type of situation. This would be a faculty-mandated isolation that he would have no real way of addressing–he would just have to endure it, and I think he’s been punished enough. Adding two days of what might as well be in-school suspension (except that depending on the logistics, it might be worse because he could actually see the fun he was missing out on) to something I think is already an absurd level of punishment just isn’t something I see any value in. Especially since doing so goes against the expressed wishes of the school. There may be some value in learning to endure bullshit, but I think the bigger lesson that he would take from it would be that consequences are arbitrary and not proportionate to actions, and that rules and punishments are not based in logic. That kind of thinking leads to a lot worse behavior down the road.
I find this opinion offensively “over the top” in overreaction. Administrators, will you please suspend Leaffan’s posting privileges for a week?
What? That’ll teach L not to overreact!
This punishment is NOT the result of a zero-tolerance policy. Opal even stated the school policy, which allows a wide latitude in deciding what the punishment should be for a “Level 2 offense.” It could have been as little as a conference and as much as 5 days out. The school clearly chose to give him the maximum penalty. I’m not sure why they decided to throw the book at him. But do be clear: this is not a situation where the school was locked into a pre-set punishment because of some law.
In my experience, the only kids who ever get 5 days out are kids who did things like bring knives to school, or credibly threatened to kill other kids, or are repeat egregious offenders. A shocker pen definitely wouldn’t get that punishment just on its own. It seems excessive given just what the OP said.
As for the last 2 days of no school activities: in my school, if a kid gets a major disciplinary action within a few week of trips, field days, and stuff like that, he cannot participate in that special activity. That’s likely why the AP said Dominic should probably stay home the last 2 days.
They could have classified it as a Level 1 offense, even.
I looked that info up today. When I went to the school to pick him up, the impression the assistant principal gave me was that this was the punishment decided by the county and that this was just “the way the county handles these things”. She definitely gave me the impression that this was not something that she had control over, but that she agreed with it. That was what led me to refer to it as zero tolerance. Finding out the reality just makes me so confused.
I am very glad to hear you will be leaving that nightmare soon. Good luck in your new location. The administration is just as capable of bullying your child as his classmates are. They just coat it in rules like zero tolerance. How much punishment have your sons bullies recieved? Don’t take that shit is my advice.
The time that he was suspended for fighting, the other kid was also suspended. Other than that as far as I know his teacher has told other kids not to pick on him, but I don’t know of any official punishments. Of course, for privacy reasons, they don’t like to tell what other people’s kids got as punishment.
Bullying is very complicated and I wish there were clear answers. Telling the other kids not to pick on him could help, it could also hurt by letting them know he is vulnerable. Lucky for him, he has a mother that has been through it.
As far as I can tell, your son brought the pen to school in search of positive attention from his classmates. There was certainly nothing sinister about it. Sure it was a mistake, but a very honest one, and it is not an unexpected behavior for an otherwise vulnerable child. For the people that want to enforce the letter of the law in this case all I have to say is “lay off a little.”
You people are missing the point.
The school had rules.
The kid broke the rules.
Now Mommy is siding with the kid? Great life lesson.
As far as I’m concerned Leaffan, you are the one that needs a life lesson. :mad:
When they came for the drawings of guns, I said nothing, for I did not have a drawing of a gun.
When they came for the shocking pens, I said nothing, for I did not have a shocking pen.
When they came for the sharpened pencils, I said nothing, for I did not have a sharpened pencil.
When they started wanding kids on the way into the classroom, I said nothing, because the rules are the rules. Thank you sir; may I have another?
I don’t understand.
I teach my kids that rules are rules. While I might not agree with them, they are in fact the rules. I didn’t make the rules, but fer Christ’s sake as you go through life there will be rules upon rules. Some you agree with, and some you don’t.
I think it’s wrong to teach kids that the rules are “stupid” or “unfair.” Life is unfair; get over it. He broke the known, published, accepted, agreed-to rules. And now he pays the known, accepted, agreed-to penalty.
His choice. His mistake. His problem. Stop fucking blaming the school board.
Yes, the school had rules. The rules say that the offense can be either level 1 or level 2. The punishment for level 2 is a range from a conference with the administrator, to 5 days suspension. Here are some other things that can be considered level 2: distributing pornography, gambling, gang activity, setting off fireworks/smoke bombs, bullying, shining a laser pointer in another person’s eye, vandalism, “amorous kissing”, mooning, possessing tobacco. I think that what he did did not warrant it being punished at the maximum level possible. He had the book thrown at him as hard as they could throw it for an offense which had no malicious intent, and which I’m sure he didn’t even realize was against the rules. I’m not saying that not knowing the rules means they don’t apply, just that he didn’t intentionally bring a contraband item to school–and I do think that intent should be taken into account when deciding consequences. He used poor judgment in playing with it on the bus, since it was disruptive. He did deserve a punishment. He did NOT deserve the punishment that he received.
I think the “life lesson” that he is getting here is that his mom will not further apply unjust punishment just because the school decided that it wanted to do so, and that I will use judgment and rationality when deciding what punishments I am going to apply at home.
His punishment from the school is suspension from school. We’re complying with that. It’s not like I’m going against the punishment dictated by the school. Is there a clause somewhere that I’m not aware of that says I have to punish him additionally at home? Which, mind you, I DID do, I just limited it to one day, which was what I felt was merited.
I’m not sure why you say that I’m “siding with the kid” in some way that is teaching him some horrible life lesson–I agree that he did something wrong and deserved punishment, I’m complying with the school’s punishment, and I applied additional punishment at home. I am disagreeing with the school in their overreaction, yes.
Where did I ever say that I thought or taught him that the rule was stupid or unfair? I agree with the rule. I wouldn’t have let him take the thing to school if I’d known he was going to. What I think is stupid and unfair is the degree of punishment. And the “known, accepted, agreed-to penalty” covers a wide, wide range of things, the maximum range of which is undoubtedly geared toward the more serious offenses. When they created the range of punishment for “level 2” I don’t think they were thinking “hmm… amorous kissing, that could be considered level 2…5 days suspension would be appropriate so let’s make that part of the range for level 2”. I think they were probably thinking that offenses such as kissing would probably be met with the lower-end of the spectrum punishments. I feel that the shock pen falls into the lower end of the “crimes” that can be considered level 2. Oh, and keep in mind, it’s considered “Level 1-2”–it’s not even clear-cut bad enough to always be “Level 2” let alone the worst possible Level 2.
Hey Opal, I feel for ya’, honestly. I’m sorry to sound so crass. All I’m saying is that my kid would have been made aware that rules are rules, and even if I disagreed with the rule, it’s not my place for interpretation. You do the crime; you pay the fine.
I’m sure Dom will be just fine and that, in time, this whole scenario will be all but forgotten. I just know that had it been my son I would have told him that rules are rules and he broke them. End of story.
You also mentioned that he’d been in trouble before. I have a hard time thinking that if he was a little angel the school would have been so hard on him. Something tells me this electric pen situation was the straw that broke the camel’s back.
Understand this. Stay away from my future childeren and off my school board you anal retentive strict constructionist, rule abiding prick of a human being. If I don’t like what’s happening to my childeren I will not rest until it changes. It’s just sad for your childeren that you would not do the same.
I’m guessing you missed the section where Opal explained the prior “trouble” was Dominic fighting back against a bully (once), and that his teacher has confirmed Dominic is a frequent target. I don’t think it’s fair to assume from that he’s been a “problem” child at school.
I had a whole post worked out, and was very worried, then I reread and found Dom was shocking people with his pens.
I say this was an overreaction. The kid violated the letter of a policy the average student could not reasonably be expected to know ( I always read the banned item list looking for loopholes, but I doubt the average kid does that). To extend the suspension to seven days makes no sense and is not supported by the policy.
RE Banning shock pens
Say whah? Static shock measures 20,000 volts and up. The shock from those pens can’t be anywhere near that.
With sincere respect, Leaffan, “rules are rules” is not a persuasive argument. Over and over and over again, history shows that “rules are rules” taken blindly can result in not-so-goodness. Some rules ARE stupid. Some rules ARE unfair. Agreement on a “what’s best for me” level may not apply. Rilchiam’s post is appropriate: Leaders can be wrong, and I hope to teach my kids that when leaders are wrong, you should not follow them. I don’t want anyone I influence to think that rules are sacred; I want everyone to think that rules are tools of (potentially flawed, but assumed to be well-meaning) humans. And if the rules are wrong, as I believe the rules-for-punishment in this case are, I hope everyone questions those rules. I would like rules to be taken seriously, but not as anything other than they are: someone’s best try at it, which maybe could be revised to be better.
Notwithstanding that OpalCat’s kid took a forbidden object where he should not have, leaders have a deep responsibility to make punishments fit crimes in a way that makes our society better. I think this punishment was a greater crime than OpalCat’s kid’s crime.
And I don’t think you sound crass. I just don’t agree with you! I hope you’ll rethink the “rules are rules” thing and I hope you and your kid(s) never have to go through anything like this. I hope no-one does, frankly. It sucks.
OpalCat, I would like to say (for what it’s worth, which ain’t all that much) that it sounds like you’re doing the best thing for your kid, if not the best thing for the overall debate. ZT riles me up, but individual kids are more important than any position statement.
Thanks 