Student Points Finger Like Gun, Gets Suspended Under Zero Tolerance Rules

[Mike]

If one were looking to find a singular, widespread example of the American people's abdication of common sense, the best of the available examples would have to be zero tolerance policies in schools. Think about it for a moment. Here we have a population consisting entirely of incomplete members of society, those that are still undergoing the learning and growth required to become fully functional members of our union. To treat that still-learning population with any measure of "zero tolerance" is antithetical in the extreme. These are the very people you would expect to make mistakes, to lack a full understanding of their surroundings and situations. They're the people in our culture most in need of tolerant learning opportunities, rather than the iron fist of bullshit justice.

Take the story reader kenichi tanaka writes us about, in which a youngster making the universal gun-symbol with one hand has ended up suspended from school. Keep in mind that Nathan Entingh is ten years old, was playing around with one of his friends, and that roughly every kid on the planet everywhere has done this exact same damned thing.

"He was pointing it at a friend's head and he said 'boom.' The kid didn't see it. No other kids saw it. But the teacher saw it," he said. "It wasn't threatening. It wasn't hostile. It was a 10-year-old kid playing."

The next morning Paul Entingh escorted his son Nathan to the principal's office, where they met with Devonshire Alternative Elementary School Principal Patricia Price.

"She said if it happened again the suspension would be longer, if not permanent," said Entingh, who also received a letter explaining the reason for Nathan's suspension as a "level 2 look alike firearm."

A level 2 look alike firearm? What the sweet hell does that mean? I'm just saying, I can make up nonsense levels about stuff, too, such as the policy on display here is a level 30 kind of stupid, with no save rolls for intelligence.

Look, I think the American people have been pretty patient with this kind of BS, but enough is enough. To take a common pantomime like this and use it to suspend a confused ten year old for three days from his place of education doesn't make a lick of sense. Worse, what could have been a learning moment about why we might not want to see kids doing that kind of thing in school was instead turned into a learning moment about the injustice of zero tolerance laws. Well done all around, Ohio educational system!

When asked what has Nathan learned from this incident, Entingh paused, then scoffed: "He's learned never to make his fingers like a gun a school again. I don't know if you consider that a life lesson."

In other words, no reason or context was taught, only uninformed respect for the power of authority. Yup, sounds about right.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story











Originally Published: Mon, 10 Mar 2014 23:21:00 GMT
source

[NIK]

America: the only country in the world where not bringing a gun to school gets you expelled.

[stormium]

don't blame the schools... blame the weaker members of society who continually drag down the rest of society. blame the people who continue to want to ban words, control thoughts and push their agendas onto others as if they were laws. blame retarded parents who are raising sniveling whiny children that can't even make a sandwich for themselves.

[Picklock]

and with all that shit..
I wonder why the peoples still not launch something like radical revolt to the government

[ddoking007]

lol nice DnD reference... XD

but really a look alike gun.... let me get this straight a 10 year old role playing cops and robers, cowboys and indains, or gansters get suspended for making a gun with his hand.... WHAT THE FUCKING HELL... this why IF I ever get married and IF I ever have kids they are going to be home schooled this shit is even harder to fucking comprehend than what I see when I randomly search the under web.... take for instance international womens day.... WHAT THE FUCK KIND OF HOLIDAY IS THAT..... I've seen and hear some BS in my 23 years of life so far but this practically takes the cake... if the term sheep worked for zero tolerance rules oh ho this would be at the top of the sheep ladder...

[Q91]

finally, someone who really use the zero tolerance properly. "A hand? No, it was formed as a gun, your out"

[KadrianBlackwolf]

I know of a case of zero-tolerance stupidity where a girl was suspended from school after her dad bought her a first aid kit for her car and the kit happened to include a razor blade.

Closer to home, a friend of mine had his son suspended from high school for pulling a friend's hat off his head and then tossing it back to him when the friend turned around. He was a bright kid who had learned to read before entering kindergarten by sounding out the titles of movies on VCR tapes. He had his son take the GED test the following week and start college the following semester, two years early.

Public schools? Why bother.

[ddoking007]

I know of a case of zero-tolerance stupidity where a girl was suspended from school after her dad bought her a first aid kit for her car and the kit happened to include a razor blade.

Closer to home, a friend of mine had his son suspended from high school for pulling a friend's hat off his head and then tossing it back to him when the friend turned around. He was a bright kid who had learned to read before entering kindergarten by sounding out the titles of movies on VCR tapes. He had his son take the GED test the following week and start college the following semester, two years early.

Public schools? Why bother.

WTF really I don't mean to take away anyone's job but that's ridiculous the father was smart to get his kid out of that school....