Good news: School officials destroy girl’s college plans over knife mix-up
posted at 9:35 pm on December 29, 2010 by Allahpundit
Suspended for the school year and charged with misdemeanor possession of a weapon on school grounds. And by “weapon,” I of course mean … a paring knife.
Just one question: Is it true?
Smithwick said personnel found the knife while searching the belongings of several students, possibly looking for drugs. She said the lunchbox really belonged to her father, Joe Smithwick, who packs a paring knife to slice his apple. He and his daughter have matching lunchboxes…
Lee County Schools Superintendent Jeff Moss said in a statement on Wednesday that the 3-inch-long knife was found in the teen’s purse, not her lunchbox. The search was conducted on Oct. 20 after a faculty member at the school discovered a student on campus with marijuana…
“She is currently enrolled as a student at the school,” Moss said.
The teen told WRAL News that she was initially given a 10-day suspension, then received notice that she was suspended the rest of the school year.
“Over two months after the event it is a mystery to us that the Smithwick’s concerns were not brought to our attention by the family through normal appeal procedures prior to going to the press,” Moss said.
I can understand why Smithwick would lie about where the knife was found but why would she lie about the length of the suspension? It should be easy to verify whether she’s going to school every day or not; maybe she’s “currently enrolled” yet still forbidden to be on campus due to the pending weapons charge. Also, as you’ll see in the clip, her “lunchbox” kind of looks like a purse. I wonder if the superintendent simply mistook it for that.
Whatever the answer, it’s comforting to know that no one will be getting shivved with an apple peeler at Southern Lee High. Exit quotation from James Lileks: “School Vouchers, please. Now. Thank you.”
Blowback
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It’s the same PC that was used against the Kindergartner who pointed at a classmate with his fingers in the shape of a gun.
flytier on December 29, 2010 at 9:39 PM
It doesn’t matter either way- even if she had a knife in her purse, it’s idiotic. Just admonish her in the principal’s office and let it be. Society has become so insane that infractions that were a slap on the wrist issue 10 years ago is now a criminal offense. That helps no one. Hell, when I was in high school, I’m pretty sure most of the guys had hunting knives, and no one thought anything of it.
I think we’re kind of doomed as a society. It’s not going back to normalcy, so where is there to go but further down?
TheBlueSite on December 29, 2010 at 9:39 PM
Zero
ToleranceBrainsSekhmet on December 29, 2010 at 9:40 PM
Insanity. Yeah, I always feel safer in a prison-like environment.
TheBlueSite on December 29, 2010 at 9:42 PM
Looks like R. Lee Ermey needs to go address the Lee County School board and Sup. Jeff Moss..:)
Dire Straits on December 29, 2010 at 9:45 PM
Supposedly the knife was found during a random search of student’s belongings looking for drugs and such.
When do the parents get to surprise the school staff by showing up announced, having security hold them in corner, and then rifle through their desks and briefcases in a search for contraband?
Illegal drugs are illegal no matter if they’re in the possession of teachers or students. We need to make sure that NO ONE on school grounds is breaking any laws, isn’t that right?
Bishop on December 29, 2010 at 9:45 PM
My school had a rifle team.
NeoKong on December 29, 2010 at 9:46 PM
My senior year in high school I used my mother’s old Girl Scout pocket knife as my key chain. It was hanging from my knapsack for all to see…including the dean of students-and do you know what happened to me…absolutely NOTHING!
I graduated from high school in ’88 and my son graduates in 2012.
It can’t come soon enough!
annoyinglittletwerp on December 29, 2010 at 9:46 PM
* We striving not for truth, but effect.
* A lie repeated thousands of times becomes a truth.
pedestrian on December 29, 2010 at 9:48 PM
Because you don’t have to think or defend your actions when you have a rule.
“But the bell rang!”
Skywise on December 29, 2010 at 9:49 PM
Mine had an archery team. I used to walk through the halls carrying a camouflage compound bow with razor sharp 4-bladers hanging from the quick quiver. I would talk hunting with the occasional teacher who stopped me to admire the bow.
Bishop on December 29, 2010 at 9:49 PM
The story keeps changing, depending on who repeats it.
“The plural of ‘anecdote’ is not ‘data’” said by someone who needs his tallywhacker hammered ten thousand times with a frozen mackerel until he concludes that sometimes one observation is enough.
Skandia Recluse on December 29, 2010 at 9:51 PM
What a misleading crock of crap. Of course she’s currently enrolled. You can’t suspend someone who isn’t enrolled.
Dusty on December 29, 2010 at 9:53 PM
We need an education revolution in this country like nobody’s business. It’s a dysfunctional empire run by a combination of PC protoplasms and wannabe Stalinists.
rrpjr on December 29, 2010 at 9:55 PM
My high school told kids not to bring guns to school in their gun racks anymore in 1992. This zero tolerance nonsense is very new.
besser tot als rot on December 29, 2010 at 9:55 PM
This is the second story in as many weeks of girls causing mayhem at schools. The last one was of the girl who accidentally brought an unloaded shotgun or rifle to school.
She too was an honor student.
What is it with all the smart, “deadly” chicks in high schools these days?
Very dangerous. Very, very dangerous.
And whatever happened to the boys throwing fire crackers down the school toilet?
BowHuntingTexas on December 29, 2010 at 9:56 PM
Nazi grade school run by teachers’ unions.
What could go wrong.
crash72 on December 29, 2010 at 9:56 PM
I think (hope) she’s over-exaggerating. She has one heck of an essay topic now, and what school would bar all students who committed misdemeanors? Some ask, but that doesn’t mean they bar you for it.
calbear on December 29, 2010 at 9:57 PM
Have you had enough yet…?
Seven Percent Solution on December 29, 2010 at 10:01 PM
NC is a conservative that has, for historical reasons, elected Democrats to run the state for the last 155 years (with a few exceptions). The Democrats, of course, run as conservatives, but govern as statists.
For the first time since Reconstruction, Republicans will control both houses of the legislature… we now need to find a GOP governor (I hate the word “gubernatorial”) candidate who isn’t a dip.
Hope and change, baby.
mankai on December 29, 2010 at 10:02 PM
the only thing i find odd about the entire thing is her lunchbox purse thing. Now my younger sister has one just like that BUT I would never carry something like that and I know my mid 50′s dad never would either. So in the story when they say that their lunchboxes were nearly identical i’m skeptical. Still, Vouchers for all!
MFn G I M P on December 29, 2010 at 10:02 PM
She is still enrolled because otherwise the school system loses money if shes not there at all anymore e.g. expelled.
This is also why many schools really have in-school suspension. Keeps the kids physically on school grounds, except they are in lockdown 99% of the time. The best of both worlds! Keep the repeat offenders separated and keep the funding!
The teachers may actually care about (some) students, but the administrators only care about their budgets and the slice of their pie from said budget. As do teacher’s unions.
Neo on December 29, 2010 at 10:02 PM
Sorry for the double comment but I figured I should add the quote from the first link.
MFn G I M P on December 29, 2010 at 10:03 PM
No worries. I’m sure Obama will be calling for her to get a second chance any minute now.
ctmom on December 29, 2010 at 10:04 PM
Another Brick in the Wall
Kini on December 29, 2010 at 10:05 PM
Zero tolerance policies are evil.
They do nothing to stop violence and only snare innocent kids in mistakes. It also focuses attention on the object and ignores behaviors and intentions while also having heavy handed penalties.
The truth is there are kids in schools today that threaten, harass and brandish weapons in class and get a free pass. It’s called a get out of jail free card. By another name it’s also called… a mental health diagnosis. Something passed out like candy by psychiatrists.
Imagine if we had zero tolerance laws throughout our society. You get caught speeding on the way to the hospital because your wife or daughter is dying in the ER. Oh, so sorry, the cop feels bad. You were only going 6 miles over the limit, but we have zero tolerance for speeding now. It’s off to jail for 20 years without parole.
Zero tolerance insanity. Too bad we don’t have zero tolerance for stupid teachers and politicians! These polices also remind me of the heavy handed laws during the middle ages. Some peasant gets sent to the dungeons for stumbling into the King’s flowerbed. There is nothing, nothing good about these policies. They go against every other sense of justice and fairness we display in our society.
I personally know of an instance where a teacher pried a weapon from a student’s hand as he was threatening to cut off people’s heads. This student has attacked other students, kicked them, threatened them and injured several teachers. The school cannot get rid of him. Know why? Mental health diagnosis! This is not an isolated case. I have had a school board member tell me outright, nothing can be done.
JellyToast on December 29, 2010 at 10:07 PM
*Rolls Eyes*
Well,maybe,six months Voter Registration Drive,er crap,
I mean “Community Organizing”,might help her cause!(snark).
canopfor on December 29, 2010 at 10:10 PM
Another Brick in the Wall
Kini on December 29, 2010 at 10:05 PM
Kini:Aloha,yup,I seen it when the movie first came out,and
the entire movie is on YouTube:)
canopfor on December 29, 2010 at 10:12 PM
Yeah, but now you’re a crazed, blood-thirsty, homicidal psychopath who regularly goes on shooting sprees in your local McDonald’s, right? :)
Dopenstrange on December 29, 2010 at 10:17 PM
Zero tolerance for idiotic PC namby-pamby lunacy.
profitsbeard on December 29, 2010 at 10:18 PM
I used to use a blowtorch on some of my high school art projects. Sometimes I was in the classroom after hours, completely unsupervised, while working on these projects. It’s a wonder I survived without some kind of zero tolerance policy to protect me. Also, kids used to show up at school straight from hunting trips, with dead animals and firearms still in their pickups. This was in the 1990s. Yay for progress……
acasilaco on December 29, 2010 at 10:19 PM
She should of claimed she was a SIKH…
Oh, wait!
Seven Percent Solution on December 29, 2010 at 10:19 PM
The point in the video is how the public education system, just churns out children without the necessary skills to move onto higher
indoctrinationeducation.Rules have now lost any common sense. Individual cases are lumped into a black and white binary decision, without any rational judgment of circumstances. The gray area.
If Parents don’t take control, then state run institutions will never change. Consequences, like this poor girl will have to live with the heavy hand of intolerance.
Kini on December 29, 2010 at 10:19 PM
That’s a stinking, low thing to say about Bishop.
Accusing a person, without any proof, of patronizing McDonald’s is just…not right!
audiculous on December 29, 2010 at 10:21 PM
Finishing an M.A. in Education. One more example of why public schools turn out the stupidest people in the world. The teachers/admin are delta alphas.
If you think your kid is different, because they go to a “good” school, I got news for you. Your kid is just as dumb. There are no good public schools in the US. Just look at PISA scores for evidence.
Tim Burton on December 29, 2010 at 10:22 PM
It just sickens me when I read a story about some good kid like this, tries hard to do what is right, studies hard and is perfect and then gets caught up in a mistake and the iron fist of government crashes down and threatens to destroy her life. They must feel so proud of themselves for destroying an innocent young girl. All while within that same government politicians get standing ovations in congress for breaking real laws.
Zero tolerance makes a mockery of real justice. It targets the innocent. Yeah, they need to crush these innocent students who do nothing but make innocent little mistakes so they can feel proud of how tough they are “on bullies and violence” because they fail everywhere else it counts!
I would love to know how many other students in that same school have gotten away with real disruptive and violent behavior without any consequences because the had a MH diagnosis.
JellyToast on December 29, 2010 at 10:24 PM
CWW, “Carrying While White”, the new crime. ✪
TXUS on December 29, 2010 at 10:24 PM
Zero tolerance policies exist to absolve the school staff of ever having to think. They never have the unenviable task of telling someone with a history of bad behavior they can’t do something that someone with no such history is allowed to do. They don’t have to face down parents of ill-mannered children and tell them to their faces their kids are rotten. Zero tolerance allows them to treat all kids “equally,” as in equally misbehaved.
It’s the same mentality that brought us TSA fondling in the name of safety.
CurtZHP on December 29, 2010 at 10:24 PM
Good grief !
I remember teachers borrowing my pocket knife for cutting needs when they forgot and left theirs at home. Or even the female teachers asking if anyone had a knife as she needed to cut something; several hands always went up as guys dug in their pockets.
And as Neokong says, we also had a rifle team. And corporal punishment, suspensions, expulsions, and lots of good times as well.
May God have mercy on America.
Robert17 on December 29, 2010 at 10:27 PM
This is completely insane. To prosecute this student and ruin her future just to prove you have the power!
BTW: My grade school principle was on the US Olympic sharpshooter team in the 50′s.
Bandit5906 on December 29, 2010 at 10:29 PM
Zero Tolerance == zero common sense == zero brains
Dasher on December 29, 2010 at 10:31 PM
you’re obviously innocent of carrying anything in your cranium or anywhere else save for a full, full bowel.
audiculous on December 29, 2010 at 10:32 PM
I spent the second half of my senior year with automatic rifles, bayonets, and hand grenades. But then again, I had graduated early and gone into the Marines…
I second everyone else here with regard to gunracks, pocket knives and all that.
My school did have a school shooting years after I graduated. Now that happened during this current area, where the schools are using these meaningless zero policies to punish good students and do nothing to stop nutjobs from bringing in pistols and killing some girls who were in a prayer circle.
TiminPhx on December 29, 2010 at 10:33 PM
Amazing! I remember an incident when our son, who is now 27 years old, was a first grader at school. He had a very small,dull, folding knife that he used for digging in the dirt. One day at school, while I was on recess duty, another duty lady came over to me and mentioned that she had seen my son digging in the dirt with the knife. She casually told him he was not to have that knife at school, took it away, and brought it to me. I didn’t realize he had brought it to school and was pretty embarrassed about it. But that was the end of it…no big deal. Yikes! If that happened today, he’d be in juvie hall…
StarLady on December 29, 2010 at 10:34 PM
Our school actually had a shooting range in the basement. They taught hunter’s safety after school hours too. I remember kids bringing their rifles to school for the range and the safety class. Kids had pocket knives. I carried a pocket knife to school frequently. Back then a pocket knife wasn’t even thought of as a weapon, it was just a pocket knife. Out of all of my 12 years of school all I remember are a few fist fights. No real violence. No school shootings, no kidnappings, nothing. Yet everybody had guns. It was so common to see guns in the back of pickup windows. You never see that anymore.
JellyToast on December 29, 2010 at 10:40 PM
Part of my 8, 11 & 12 year old’s home schooling this year was knife throwing at Jujitsu camp. When the oldest turns 13 we’ll be going to the pistol range.
Don’t wait for the government to pay for your kids education. Take it over now.
29Victor on December 29, 2010 at 10:47 PM
Zero tolerance is used when common sense is absent for the day.
rukiddingme on December 29, 2010 at 10:49 PM
Another school run by narcissistic imbeciles that has idiotic policies. Why they would go to the press instead of begging before their betters at the school is truly a great mystery.
AbeFroman on December 29, 2010 at 10:52 PM
Wendys, just because I once got a half full chocolate shake at the drive thru.
Bishop on December 29, 2010 at 10:58 PM
The PISA test is flawed. Considering it as evidence is speaking too well of it. The only thing it’s really able to do is justify non-US systems.
Unlike those other countries, the US doesn’t make a point of using a test score to absolutely determine how much freedom and opportunity one should get. Nor does the US participate in banding to arbitrarily separate people. Where other countries groom the few, the US allows a lot more people, even if it doesn’t do well for PISA.
If PISA actually controlled for that, they’d find the US a lot higher.
sethstorm on December 29, 2010 at 10:58 PM
I’d go off at a McDonalds, because they use “the shake machine’s broken” when they mean “we cleaned it already, and don’t want to make you a shake.”
massrighty on December 29, 2010 at 11:15 PM
Since when is anything minus intent is a weapon?
Speakup on December 29, 2010 at 11:16 PM
I was a high school administrator for over two decades and a principal for 15 years until I retired. Here’s a dirty little secret that most bureaucrats know – at least an old superintendent told me 30 years ago.
“Board policies” give weaklings something to hide behind.
The only appropriate definition of “zero tolerance” is that we won’t tolerate behavior X, Y, or Z. We won’t ignore it. We will deal with it. It must not not mean we will suspend or expel a student from school largely to protect our own backsides.
This is the same “we-only-follow-orders” mindset that leads to kindergartners being suspended as sex offenders for hugging classmates or 7-year-olds being arrested for bringing aspirin to school.
Fire them all, including the school boards.
Drained Brain on December 29, 2010 at 11:19 PM
Radical jihadists will have no problem enslaving this generation of pathetic hand-wringing, limp-wristed dhimmi wusses. Thank God most of the so-called “Greatest Generation” that gave so much to ensure our freedom isn’t around to witness their sacrifices going down the toilet.
bannedbyhuffpo on December 29, 2010 at 11:22 PM
Here in Portland, Oregon a little boy boy was suspended from first grade (in a *very* expensive neighborhood full of white liberals) for bringing in an action figure complete with its action-figure-sized green and yellow plastic “gun”.
Zero tolerance, baby! Strangely enough, I don’t remember feeling any safer when I heard about it…
littlemary on December 29, 2010 at 11:26 PM
1st, superintendents don’t conduct searches. Mr. Moss’s information is probably third-hand at best. Faculty member-principal-superintendent.
2nd, a suspension is not an expulsion. In order for a student to be suspended, they must be enrolled.
I don’t know if this is sloppy reporting, or if this Moss guy is just a slimeball, but I wouldn’t put it past school officials to lie every bit as much as the students.
forest on December 29, 2010 at 11:35 PM
since the beginning of the common law, and longer.
audiculous on December 29, 2010 at 11:42 PM
There’s not a jury in the land that would convict you.
Dopenstrange on December 29, 2010 at 11:48 PM
Zero tolerance policies are designed to limit the number of lawsuits brought to school districts. Everyone must be equally miserable because otherwise, if someone was not punished as much as someone else for a similar offense, a discrimination lawsuit, or whatever, could be brought upon the school.
So, yes, the zero-tolerance rules are completely insane, but the school districts who enforce them are not the cause of the problem. It’s whacko judges who allow frivolous lawsuits to be brought upon schools for the latter using common sense and discretion in enforcing rules. So, until laws are passed to make it harder for judges to allow dopey “that’s not fair!” lawsuits, we will expect to see more students getting expelled for being caught with an Advil in their backpack.
Weebork on December 29, 2010 at 11:57 PM
In 99.999% of our lawsuit world I say p*** on the people crying foul. In this case I hope she sues every frakkin one of us.
Limerick on December 30, 2010 at 12:01 AM
Since most leftists can not think for themselves, they instituted zero tolerance policies when the near mindless actions made the lack of judgment, and intelligence in the majority of the graduates of the teaching curriculum obvious.
Slowburn on December 30, 2010 at 12:02 AM
besser tot als rot on December 29, 2010 at 9:55 PM
AZfederalist on December 30, 2010 at 12:04 AM
I used to wonder why my middle school had archery and my high school did not…no longer.
Dark-Star on December 30, 2010 at 12:08 AM
I had some experience at shifting through stories like this before.
For the knife story, the school is the one lying. Maybe there is some technical truth to the school story (she’s still “enrolled” but isn’t allowed on campus).
Someone in a position of power at that school does not like Miss Smithwick, saw an opportunity, and is now hurting her. (Seen it plenty of times, little wannabe tyrants all over the place- always claiming to themselves that it’s for the other persons “own good”).
In the other case mentioned at the link about the candy cane detention- in that one the boys are… well not lying exactly, but being deceptive. It’s pretty obvious that they were handing on candy canes, and then they saw a group a kids that are the “outcasts” in the school and they threw a few candy canes at them. The punishment of detention was the appropriate thing to happen.
Of course the school administrators are still morons. Claiming the candy canes are weapons? Putting something generic like “disruptive” as the offense? Idiots.
Just put: “hazing” or “harassment of other students”, or even just plain old “bullying”. Used to be those were sufficient to let everyone know what is going on and why the kids are being punished. Now we got to use lawyer speak for everything.
Sackett on December 30, 2010 at 12:14 AM
Total separation of mind and State.
Mojave Mark on December 30, 2010 at 12:37 AM
When I went to high school here in Dallas back in the mid ’70s, I carried a pocket knife, as did a lot of other kids.
And years before that, lots of high schools’ ROTC programs had their own rifle teams, complete with basement armories.
Ward Cleaver on December 30, 2010 at 12:39 AM
Zero
ToleranceCommon Sense.Ward Cleaver on December 30, 2010 at 12:40 AM
Zero tolerance means what it says. Every school in the country has the same policies…and have for years. Every kid with 2 ears and pimples knows better. No policy is perfect and she has my sympathies but several million kids managed to go to school that day without a knife.
The system works. The proof is that we so seldom hear of these extreme cases….this is not the norm, it’s called a slow news cycle.
repvoter on December 30, 2010 at 12:54 AM
Not, nothing is a weapon without intent. Just because a law says something is naughty doesn’t make it a weapon otherwise a bag of flour is dangerous.
Speakup on December 30, 2010 at 1:03 AM
When I went to high school here in Dallas back in the mid ’70s, I carried a pocket knife, as did a lot of other kids.
And years before that, lots of high schools’ ROTC programs had their own rifle teams, complete with basement armories.
Ward Cleaver on December 30, 2010 at 12:39 AM
I went to school in the ’80′s and I also had a pocketknife.
annoyinglittletwerp on December 30, 2010 at 1:22 AM
Zero Tolerance requires zero intelligence, but it is the lawsuits which brought the policy about. They were almost all racially based, since if black juvenile delinquents were suspended for their guns and switchblades, white cheerleaders could not be allowed to carry plastic butter knives to spread peanut butter on their crackers at lunch, and God forbid a white 5 year old point his finger at someone and say, “Bang!”.
Adjoran on December 30, 2010 at 1:25 AM
My favorite story is when we visit Folsom Stadium on the CU campus for CU Band Day. At the entrance, they have a handwritten sign that says:
Warning: Artificial weapons in use.
Referring to color guard rifles of course.
I’d like to say ‘only in Boulder’ but that’s no longer true.
Common Sense on December 30, 2010 at 1:31 AM
Meanwhile in Chicago, Detroit and LA kids kill each other without fear of anyone or anything…………and nobody says a F’n word.
What a joke!
dmann on December 30, 2010 at 2:02 AM
This is nothing more than incompetent bureaucrats protecting their butts by hiding behind “zero tolerance” and “the children.” Reality is it is safer for them to follow zero tolerance to extreme absurdities because they are then never at risk of having to exercise judgement and perhaps make the wrong decision. So instead of the rational thing, which is to warn her not to bring a paring knife to school again, they hit her with the zero tolerance club, and then for her parents embarrassing them they are trying to crush her as a warning to others.
EasyEight on December 30, 2010 at 2:42 AM
The board members and administrators who have imposed a “zero tolerance” regime continue to impose it, in part, because the Americans suffer them to go on living, without injury, without loss, and perhaps without even fear of any of these things. Your rulers seem to expect nearly entire passivity of you, inasmuch as it seems that after you have flicked a few levers or punched a few holes in a piece of paper, you will reliably go home and accept whatever they do to you or a loved one, so long as they can at all persuasively argue that they did what they did under color of some law.
Kralizec on December 30, 2010 at 3:06 AM
BYO Lunch Bags seem to be pretty popular, so it makes the school look bad insisting that the paring knife and apple were in her “purse.” Yeah, it could have been a mistake to think it was that at first, but now it shows they don’t care about facts at this point, just image, and they’re too stupid to realize how they are making a bad image worse.
Did the Dad really have a matching gray lunch bag? I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s just a cover story, but who knows? This weird excuse implies there really is a twin gray lunch bag in the house, and it was either the Dad’s or just a convenience for her to have two. If a teen girl had two lunch bags would they both be identical? and gray? Not for any teen girl I know. Regardless, it shouldn’t be relevant!
Unions and political correctness are killing America.
http://www.google.com/images?q=byo+lunchbags&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&oe=&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=og&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wi&biw=1492&bih=719
G. Charles on December 30, 2010 at 3:20 AM
School administrated pulverized pea brains.
10 days. Understandable given the PC “no tolerance” for weapons. But the extension to the year simply proves what public education is. She had the wrong attitude and miffed the bureaucrats ever ready to punish a nonthreatening student in order to prove veracity in “purpose” — mind games of domination rather than logic.
maverick muse on December 30, 2010 at 6:01 AM
“but several million kids managed to go to school that day without a knife.”
Several million children are not ‘screened for silverware’ every day. If they were there would probably be MANY more instances. You sound like one of these maroons who institute such ignorant policies. Are you a teacher perhaps?
Harry S on December 30, 2010 at 6:25 AM
Today’s political climate means there’s a very prudent reason for the mindlessly universal application of “maximum-intolerance” policies. If they focused on the primary threat of weapons-carrying gangbangers, most of whom are ethnic minorities, instead of butter-knife-packing honor students charges of racial discrimination would follow.
kd6rxl on December 30, 2010 at 7:02 AM
I can understand why AP might not know what he’s talking about. BYO makes lunch BAGS. Like the one in the pictuure.
gitarfan on December 30, 2010 at 7:33 AM
They should revise whatever moronic law is behind this stupidity and place the burden of proof on the SCHOOL and THE SCHOOL DISTRICT, not on the student!
In other words, have the SCHOOL prove that the student indeed had intentions to cause some kind of harm or damage by their actions, not act some some stupid boneheaded assumption.
Because if such a provision in the law existed, in this case, the school would not have a leg to stand on.
pilamaye on December 30, 2010 at 7:38 AM
Hmmm…maybe I’m reading it wrong, but I don’t think it says that. It simply says…
I took that to mean the school changed the suspension.
Deanna on December 30, 2010 at 8:10 AM
And mine had a shiv team.
They even made the state finals (at state pen).
FlameWarrior on December 30, 2010 at 8:26 AM
The girl who got caught with a hunting rifle in the trunk of her car on school grounds during hunting season got off. No suspension. She had been hunting that morning and didn’t think it would be a problem. School officials were doing a random search for pot which is all but legal in MT and she told them about the gun.
Kissmygrits on December 30, 2010 at 8:34 AM
Actually, school officials have done her a tremendous favor by destroying her college plans.
Think about what would have happened had not school officials intervened and saved her: She matriculates to a name-brand university neither she nor her parents can afford, she majors in one of the many useless liberal arts fields the university offers, graduates fully indoctrinated into liberalism and carrying $100,000 in federal student loan debt, she spends the next two years searching in vain for a job in the field she studied, she ends up stuffing envelopes for minimum wage at her local Democrat Party headquarters, she eventually defaults on the student loans she cannot ever possibly repay, and then the really horrible consequences kick in.
Now, with her college plans luckily ruined, she can attend community college at a mere fraction the cost of that university and in the process learn a useful trade or vocation in a field like automotive or plumbing. She’ll graduate debt-free and quickly find work in her chosen field, make a ton of money and live happily ever after.
For this, she’ll have her high school to thank.
FlameWarrior on December 30, 2010 at 8:42 AM
Of course, feeling safe and being safe are two different things. VA Tech students felt safe.
BierManVA on December 30, 2010 at 8:42 AM
School administrations that behave in this way should be charged under RICO.
Seriously though. At a certain point malice and stupidity does become criminal, and they passed that point a long time ago.
leereyno on December 30, 2010 at 8:46 AM
Fox News…calling Fox News. Put this young woman and her family on TV first thing on Monday morning. Toss this PR hot potato in NC liberals’ laps—what a great way to start their New Year off right
smagar on December 30, 2010 at 9:11 AM
Back when I was in HS in the early 70s, blacks used their Fro picks as weapons. Us white guys used bare knuckles.
44Magnum on December 30, 2010 at 9:30 AM
Just make her take some classes on the perils of Global warming and read Obama’s book and end it at that.
tomas on December 30, 2010 at 9:45 AM
Liberalism is a progressive mental disorder. Just deal with it because it is here and not going away. I spend alot of time in London. You will not believe what is coming. This is nothing.
volsense on December 30, 2010 at 9:50 AM
What’s next in schools, full body pat downs of our children? Maybe we can get Big Sis involved.
Wade on December 30, 2010 at 9:54 AM
Ah, when Michelle Obama’s make ‘em eat fruit edict gets enforced will the school cafeterias be allowed to have knives or will the fruit be mashed up first and served in bio-degradable squeeze bags?
in_awe on December 30, 2010 at 9:59 AM
Zero tolerance. Also, zero judgement by school officials. Who would bring a paring knife to school for use as a weapon?
And a person’s past actions do matter. If a bright girl with no record of trouble brings a fruit knife and a piece of fruit to school, should she be suspended?
hawksruleva on December 30, 2010 at 10:00 AM
Rednecks at my school wore long chains on their wallets, and used those chains in fights.
hawksruleva on December 30, 2010 at 10:01 AM
True liberal lunacy. Nothing more, nothing less.
ultracon on December 30, 2010 at 10:47 AM
We home school.
pugwriter on December 30, 2010 at 11:12 AM
Wifey, who is a substitute teacher, was recently reprimanded by a principal for not allowing a habitually trouble making teen go to the restroom. This was after another teacher on staff let the kid go and he wasn’t seen again for three periods.
No common sense allowed.
pugwriter on December 30, 2010 at 11:17 AM
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