Can't Secure The Borders, But We Sure Can Take Down 5th Graders

Annie · #1 (**permalink**) 05-13-2006, 07:22 AM

Zero tolerance strikes again...

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pitt.../s_453040.html

Quote:

Student weapons policy backfires

By Eric Heyl
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Friday, May 12, 2006

At least they didn't call in the SWAT team.

Penn Hills School District officials, however, did react swiftly and harshly when Jokari Becker triggered a crisis of near-Columbine proportions by bringing a toy gun to school for a class project.

First, they suspended the Dible Elementary School fifth-grader for three days. Then they decided that wasn't punishment enough. So they suspended him for an additional seven days.

They decided that wasn't quite punishment enough, either. So on Tuesday, they expelled Jokari. He won't be allowed back in school until January -- at the earliest.

At the rate the penalties keep increasing, Jokari soon might find himself strapped on a gurney while Superintendent Patricia Gennari administers a lethal injection.

Gennari did not return calls Thursday, but Melissa Becker, 32, Jokari's mother, was available. She remains dumbfounded over the disciplinary action.

"This whole thing is absurd," she said.

It's difficult to dispute her assertion.

Few would confuse the fluorescent, oversized, green-and-orange plastic toy with a Glock.

Jokari brought the gun to school for inclusion in a memory box he was making. He kept it in his book bag until it was time to work on the project.

Jokari never pointed the unloaded gun at a student or teacher. Even if it had been loaded, even if he had aimed it at a classmate, no one would have been in jeopardy.

"It says 'paintball' on the gun, but it doesn't shoot paintball pellets," Melissa Becker said. "It shoots water soluble paint. It's a kid's toy."

A kid's toy that wouldn't even have ruined anyone's clothes.

This might be mildly amusing if Melissa Becker wasn't a single mother trying to raise Jokari and his 12-year-old brother while completing her education at Point Park University.

Her major: Criminal justice.

While an appeal of the expulsion is being prepared, Melissa Becker wonders how she is going to juggle her family and occupational obligations.

Her son is barred from school, and she is scheduled to begin training next week to become an Allegheny County 911 emergency dispatcher.

"I don't know what I'm going to do yet, but of course I'm not going to leave my child home alone," she said.

Meanwhile, Penn Hills residents -- who are facing a significant 4.48-mill school tax increase -- will pay to have Jokari tutored because he apparently is too much of a menace to mingle with other students.

The district student discipline code bars students from bringing to school weapons, replicas of weapons or any instrument capable of inflicting serious bodily injury.

It's difficult to find any evidence of misconduct by Jokari. Unloaded squirt guns don't cause serious bodily injury.

The code also states, "No disciplinary action should exceed in degree the seriousness of the offense."

District officials need to re-familiarize themselves with that portion of the code. They have violated their policies far more egregiously than the student they expelled.

Nienna · #2 (**permalink**) 05-13-2006, 07:34 AM

Yeah... that's pretty crazy. I guess the "replica of weapon" clause could be the reason for this, but, from the description (fluorescent green), I don't think it could seriously be considered.

I was a little afraid last week... My son takes an inhaler for his asthma. He uses a spacer with it, bc he's not quite coordinated enough yet to press the inhaler, suck in his breath, and hold it. The spacers are $25, so we just have one. I send it back & forth to school in his bookbag. The nurse has an inhaler there (which I had to bring in, give written permission for her to administer it to my son, and bring the dr's prescription), and we have one at home.

Well, the other day, I forgot to take the inhaler out of the spacer when I packed it in his bookbag. So, he could have been expelled for bringing drugs to school. Nothing happened, but with stories like the one above circulating, I was a little concerned about what could have happened.

Bullypulpit · #3 (**permalink**) 05-13-2006, 08:37 AM

You know, I carried a pocket knife to school form the time I got one when I was 10 until I graduated from high-school. And sometimes, after going to school from a morning of hunting, I had a Buck folder with a 4 inch blade strapped to my belt, But it was never an issue. Many did so, we learned early on that knives and guns were tools...not toys.

Annie · #4 (**permalink**) 05-13-2006, 01:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bullypulpit

You know, I carried a pocket knife to school form the time I got one when I was 10 until I graduated from high-school. And sometimes, after going to school from a morning of hunting, I had a Buck folder with a 4 inch blade strapped to my belt, But it was never an issue. Many did so, we learned early on that knives and guns were tools...not toys.

We are supposed to send any student that brings 'weapons or replicas', including drawings to the principal and depending on her judgement, the least offensive will result in a detention, though the most offensive could be immediate expulsion. This is a parochial school. Since I teach 6-8th grades and anime is the most popular 'time waster' of the kids, drawings with weapons is a several times a day offense. Needless to say, unless the kid were a 'scary one' which none are currently in 'that way', the drawings are ripped and filed in circular file.

We do have discretion, which is a good thing. A few years ago there was a 3rd grader that was into killing animals, threatening to burn down the school, stabbed another child with a pencil. He is gone.