Zero-tolerance out of control: Pencil leads to boy's suspension, while Eagle Scout hit with felony

I'll be damned if (Lord willing) I get blessed with children and I put them in a government-run school.

They're not here yet.  But I already love them too much than to subject them to the insanity of a modern public school.  And few things exemplify that madness more than do zero-tolerance policies.

(Hey, I ran for school board once.  It can't be said that I never tried to make the public schools better.  But things won't going to get better until more people get up the gumption to tell the bureaucrats "ENOUGH!")

Two stories demonstrating my point.  The first is about seven-year old Christopher Marshall of Suffolk, Virginia.  He was suspended from his elementary school last week per a policy of "zero tolerance".

What was his crime?  Pointing a pencil as if were a gun at another student and making "bang! bang!" noises with it.

Yeah, you read that right.  That's all that little Christopher was doing.

From the story at WAVY.com...

Seven-year-old Christopher Marshall says he was playing with another student in class Friday, when the teacher at Driver Elementary asked them to stop pointing pencils at each other.

"When I asked him about it, he said, 'Well I was being a Marine and the other guy was being a bad guy,'" said Paul Marshall, the boy's father. "It's as simple as that."

Christopher's father was a Marine for many years. He thinks school leaders overreacted.

"A pencil is a weapon when it is pointed at someone in a threatening way and gun noises are made," said Bethanne Bradshaw, a spokesperson for Suffolk Public Schools.

The Suffolk school system has a "zero tolerance policy" when it comes to weapons. And, Bradshaw admits, that policy has tightened up in recent years because of widely publicized school shootings.

"Some children would consider it threatening, who are scared about shootings in schools or shootings in the community," said Bradshaw. "Kids don't think about 'Cowboys and Indians' anymore, they think about drive-by shootings and murders and everything they see on television news every day."

And then there is the tale of Eagle Scout, honor student, devout Christian and model young man Cole Withrow from Princeton, a small town near Raleigh here in North Carolina.  Cole had been skeet shooting and accidentally left his shotgun in his vehicle when he came to school late last month.  Cole realized his error and sought to do the right thing: he went to the office and called his mom to come and take the gun out and away from the campus.  Unfortunately one of the staff at Princeton High School overheard the call and alerted the police.

Cole Withrow with his sister Hannah Walker

Cole was arrested on felony charges and expelled.  He will not walk with his classmates at graduation in a few weeks.  All for trying to do the right thing in the matter.  For trying to do what his faith and his vows as a Boy Scout would have him to do.

Cole will be allowed to graduate, just not from his own school.  His family is fighting for Cole's right to be with his classmates.

But at least his troubles caught the attention of Jerry Falwell Jr., the president of Liberty University.  Cole Withrow has been offered a scholarship to attend the college.  Harding University has also extended a similar offer to Cole.

Is it paranoia?  Is it laziness?  Is it intentional conditioning of the kids on the part of the public school educators and administrators?  For whatever reason it is, this kind of thing has gone on... and continues to go on... for far too long.

"Zero-tolerance"?  More like "zero common sense".

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Middle-school students threatened by faculty over "offensive" t-shirts

Genoa-Kingston Middle School student Michael McIntyre is a young supporter of the men and women serving in the armed forces.  So much so that he has taken to show his enthusiasm for the United States Marine Corps by wearing this t-shirt (left).

But in spite of wearing it many times to school, Michael has now been threatened with suspension by his school's faculty and administration unless he removed or "covered up" his Marines shirt.  It was deemed inappropriate and against school policy to have an image of a gun.

It's the sort of story that we're hearing too much of lately: public school students either threatened with suspension or suspended outright because they draw pictures of guns, or point their fingers like guns on the playground, or even go "bang bang!" at each other.

Now it's a t-shirt that says "Marines" and features two military rifles crossed.  As if Marines have any other tool of their trade...

"What the hell are we supposed to use man? Harsh language?"

Pull the trigger here for the full story at usofarn.com.

Meanwhile in Florida, student Summer Schreiner was told she'd be suspended from school if she refused to doff her t-shirt bearing a pro-abstinence message.  From the story at the Christian Post:

A school in Florida asked an 8th-grader to change her t-shirt carrying a message of sexual abstinence that she received at a Christian conference, saying it is "inappropriate." The t-shirt the 15-year-old girl was made to change into said, "Tomorrow I will dress for success."

Summer Schreiner of Cocoa, Fla., wore a t-shirt with the words "Don't drink and park... accidents cause kids" to class at Clearlake Middle. She says she was told by the assistant principal to change it because it was "inappropriate."

"I got through lunch, and on my way back, the assistant principal tells me I need to go to the office and change my shirt," she told Fox 35.

Summer received the shirt the night before at a conference organized by The Silver Ring Thing conference, which seeks to "create a culture shift in America where abstinence becomes the norm again rather than the exception." After teenagers make the pledge of abstinence, they receive a silver ring.

"I was pretty upset. I thought it was silly," Summer said. "It's not like I was wearing a curse word or something that was promoting violence. It's the shirt I got at a conference that is something that is very important to me."

Is it just me, or do too many school systems seem to have a requisite that teachers must lose their common sense before being employed?  If she were a few years older Summer could probably go to the nurse at her high school and get free condoms, no questions asked.

No, I won't put my children through a public school system.  Not if the public schools keep up with this ludicrous behavior.  My children aren't here yet but I already love them too damned much than to subject them to this kind of insanity.

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Girl expelled from school for borrowing asthma inhaler

Alyssa McKinney has learned a valuable lesson courtesy of Lewis-Palmer Middle School in Monument, Colorado (and its primary asshole Superintendent of Schools John Borman)...

“The lesson that I learned from this is not to help people, because helping people is just going to get yourself in trouble,” McKinney said.

McKinney's classmate Breana Crites was having an asthma attack during a gym class last month. Alyssa McKinney let Crites borrow her asthma inhaler. It might have saved Breana Crites' life, or at the very least kept her from being hospitalized.

But for that act of Good Samaritanship, Alyssa was placed on ten days' suspension (with the possibility of expulsion if the school "administration" judges she makes one measly further "mistake) and Crites was expelled for the rest of the year.

Read all about it here.

Superintendent John Borman had this to say...

“I think absolutely the suspension was appropriate.”

People like Bastardorman are going to be the destruction of whatever good is left in this country. A person's life was very likely at stake and this soulless automaton doesn't give a damn. All that matters is absolute obedience to The Rules and those who decree them.

They'll still be insisting "But we were only following orders" right up to the moment that they're thrown against the wall.

Tip o' the hat to Scott Bradford for directing our attention to this latest instance of public education insanity.

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Boy Scouts under assault from insane zero-tolerance policies

Matthew Whalen is an Eagle Scout from upstate New York. He got suspended for a month from school for having a pocketknife in his car while it was parked on his school's campus.

Zachary Christie is a six-year old Cub Scout from Delaware who was sentenced to 45 days in reform school. His "crime"? Bringing a spork (combination spoon and fork) to school so that he could use it to eat his pudding.

Fortunately however, the ensuing public uproar embarrassed administrators enough to bring Christie back to his regular school. And Whalen has been assured by West Point Military Academy that his situation will not be a mark against him when he applies for admission (something he has dreamed of since first grade).

It's "zero tolerance" craziness like this that has contributed a lot to a loss of faith in America's public education system. What the hell is going on when we as a people are getting indoctrinated from an early age to fear things like plastic knives?!

But at least Matthew Whalen has nothing to be worried about. Before too long, he'll be strutting proudly across campus... carrying a machine gun!

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Teenage girl is hero, still gets Saturday detention

15-year old Amanda Rouse wasn't feeling very well, so she stayed on her school bus for a ride back home from Marina High School. While the bus was on the road the driver fell out of her seat and hit her head. The bus went out of control and hit two cars, and had Amanda not jumped out of her seat to apply the brakes, this might have turned out a lot worse.

Because of her quick thinking, Amanda Rouse saved the lives of 40-some people on the school bus and perhaps those of others also. The girl is a heroine.

And now school administrators are punishing Amanda with Saturday detention for her "truancy".

Too many school officials in this country - not all of them, but darn enough of them - are heartless, unthinking robots. Those of Marina High School exemplify this. Not to mention this story demonstrates why "zero tolerance" policies are ridiculous without fail.

But never mind them. Amanda Rouse, however it happened, you were in the right place at the right time... and you did the right thing in the circumstance. My hat's off to ya!

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