I hadn't realised it was getting quite that bad, but then look what has been happening in the news recently.
Confiscating of mobile phones is a problem. A lot of kids have those phones for legitimate reasons, and because of a few mongrels they're losing the use of them. I do have a problem with schools confiscating anything, I'm not sure its entirely legal. Then there's the whole problem of a student who has had a phone confiscated then getting into trouble of some sort after school where a phone would provide safety or assistance.
We only take them (I teach in a middle school) if they're caught with the phone
on during class - cheating via cell phone is the newest rage, as is texting for a variety of other reasons. First offense, the child signs a contract stating that s/he understands the cell phone rules (included on the contract). Second offense, the parent signs the same contract as the child, when picking up the phone. Third offense, the phone is confiscated until the end of the school year... usually resulting in the child getting a new phone (not much of a negative consequence when that happens).
Lots of parents complain if their child's cell phone is taken - and cite the reasons you give - but the biggest complaint is the inconvenience of having to come get it. The fact remains, however, that the school has the right to remove items from a student if the item is detrimental to the learning process of the student or students in the vicinity - and that includes cell phones, as they are used to cheat, to spread rumors, to spread threats, and so on. After all, it's been less than a decade that cell phones have been as accessible - and people survived without them before that time. There's a phone in every classroom in my building, and parents MUST contact the office to pick a child up or have the child released from school - and they MUST do so directly to the office - something else they complain about vociferously, despite the safety risk inherent if we were to let kids leave the school because some unidentifiable voice on a cell phone says to do so - think Ferris Buehler.
This is, however, somewhat off the topic of the thread, which is a judge who did not punish a child who defended herself, despite a zero tolerance policy for violence. You said:
I hadn't realised it was getting quite that bad, but then look what has been happening in the news recently.
Confiscating of mobile phones is a problem. A lot of kids have those phones for legitimate reasons, and because of a few mongrels they're losing the use of them. I do have a problem with schools confiscating anything, I'm not sure its entirely legal. Then there's the whole problem of a student who has had a phone confiscated then getting into trouble of some sort after school where a phone would provide safety or assistance.
Well, cell phones are just one in a long list of items and/or activities that have been banned at schools because they are detrimental to student learning - as detrimental, in their way, as the violence that sparked the thread. In too many instances, policies, statutes, laws, etc., are written in response to an occurrence or series of occurrences, which don't address the root problem, and punish the non-offenders considerably more than the offenders. Too many laws are written in reaction to negative events, in an effort to prevent future occurrences - but unless something addresses the underlying cause of the problem, laws that punish offenders are not likely to prove much of a deterrent, as can be seen by the current state of our legal system.
That this judge was willing to take the time to investigate the fight and exonerate the girl who was defending herself, rather than upholding a statute written in reaction to negative events, speaks well for him; I can only hope there are more like him out there.
. I don't know of course, but I feel for a principal trying to end violence, but he should listen to his own employees.
