Has zero tolerance gone too far?...

[beth1122]

That is why i keep saying this ti everyone "Stop giving them privacy!"
The problem is that our kids just get to much privacy and we do not know what they do in their closed room, with friends or online.
Take their computer and put it in the living-room, ask them who are their friends, put a racking software on their computer - anything.
Just keep them safe until they grow.
Get involve - do not close your eye.
It is never to late.

 

[Rachael]

This is an example of political correctness gone too far, and must have been an upsetting and confusing situation for the little girl.

 

[codesforkids]

I feel so guilty. We play with squirt guns in our pool. I don't really consider them weapons just a game we play. I guess that makes me a bad parent. We also have snowball fights in the winter and evidently that is now a banned game.

 

[karla]

Laugh all you want but with American children killing each other on a daily basis it's not surprising that this child was suspended. I'm sure if this was a child from one of those scary countries....let's say Iran, you people would be cheering on the principal

 

[singledad]

Laugh all you want but with American children killing each other on a daily basis it's not surprising that this child was suspended. I'm sure if this was a child from one of those scary countries....let's say Iran, you people would be cheering on the principal

Please tell me you're kidding.... Or would you seriously have an issue with a 5 year old girl with a pink bubble gun, just because a tiny minority of the people from her home country were extremist lunatics?

 

[cybele]

Yeah... those scary scary small children.

 

[IADad]

The problem is once we start treating everything like a threat, and removing it, we all start to lose our ability to identify danger. Germs in an antiseptic environment or kids in a Skinner box...can't identify dangers because they've never had to assess danger. It's the same reason people sue for being burned with clothes irons or cut by knives. Our society's desire to protect everyone from everything will ultimately be our downfall.

 

[GraceWiffie]

The tolerance level of a persons mind has gone too far.People does not have patience enough to restore his or her mind.People have to find a way to think that if someone just take time to do a work he will be good in future.

 

[IADad]

Here's an example of on reason zero tolerance makes zero sense:

http://abcnews.go.com/US/massachusetts-honor-student-erin-cox-punished-giving-drunken/story?id=20576121[/url]

Zero tolerance only makes sense to those enforcing rules. It makes it easy, not fair. As a society we say this is wrong - why have judges? Let's just let the police arrest people and sentence them on the spot. That's what's happening here. Many cases of this type of thing, where the attitude it "well, some innocent people may end up punished, but it keeps the guilty from skating out by making excuses.) The end does not justify the means.

 

[cybele]

That just makes me angry, she's being punished because someone has their facts backwards, even the police are backing her up.

 

[mom2many]

Saw that on the news, and was like what the hell ?

That poor girl is being ostracized when she didn't do anything wrong. But the school doesn't want to back down because they don't want to admit they're a bunch of idiots.

Here's a young girl trying to do the right thing, and being treated like a criminal. It's that kind of crap pisses me off.

 

[IADad]

That just makes me angry, she's being punished because someone has their facts backwards, even the police are backing her up.

the part that pisses me off is that the facts seem to be irrelevant. They have a rule that states X and they are going to enforce that rule no matter what good breaking the rule might have done.

Suppose they had a rule about no teacher is supposed to re-enter the school after kids have been evacuated for a fire alarm. I guaran-damn-tee it that if a teacher ran into a burning school to rescues a child left behind, that teacher would be a hero, not punished for breaking the rules.

We are teaching the wrong message with zero tolerance, we are teaching kids to follow rules, even when they don't make sense. To suppress compassion and follow the norm, to not use any judgement what-so-ever. Sad and dangerous. And it's all because it's easier for administrators.

 

[TabascoNatalie]

Scary part is how intrusive the schools get into individuals' personal lives. The said incident was nowhere near school grounds -- so who really gives the school the right to carry out judgements?

 

[cybele]

I'm curious about that too, why does the school have any say on what happens off school grounds?

 

[IADad]

I'm curious about that too, why does the school have any say on what happens off school grounds?

Well here's the deal as I understand it, and this goes on in schools across the country. Technically, the student isn't in trouble with the school, she hasn't been suspended or academically punished. She has been suspended from her volleyball team. Essentially what happens is that students in extra-curricular activities have a code of conduct they must adhere to in order to participate in the activity. And in this case the code includes not attending parties where alcohol is present. So, since she technically was there, she's in violation of the code and therefore suspended from the team. The "school" is really only involved because they sponsor the athletic program. So, it makes a certain amount of sense for these teams to extend into student's away from school time, but it certainly doesn't make sense to administer the policies as zero tolerance. That just makes it easy, not fair.

 

[Natasha]

This is a good example of schools taking it too far, yes children need to know the difference between right and wrong but at the same time we live in a social climate where school teachers are worried and paranoid about what might happen.

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