Student suspended for taking razor from self-harming classmate

[The Straight Story]

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — We teach kids that honesty is the best policy, but at one Virginia Beach middle school it might be better to keep the truth to yourself.

Last Thursday at Bayside Middle School, sixth grader Adrionna Harris came to the aide of a classmate who was cutting his arm. She faces expulsion for taking a razor from the student, throwing it away and convincing him what he was doing wasn’t right. She thought she was doing the right thing, so on Friday she told the school administration what happened. The way school officials responded led to this question: was the school’s zero tolerance policy taken too far?

Instead of getting praise from the school administration, Adrionna got a 10 day suspension with recommendation for expulsion. The interesting thing — the only reason Adrionna got suspended was because she admitted what happened. The alleged weapon was thrown away, and it was her word alone that led to her suspension.

“I was shocked and surprised. I was very shocked that a student would get suspended for saving another child,” said Rachael Harris, Adrionna’s mother. “The school system over-reached absolutely.”

http://wavy.com/2014/03/19/student-suspended-for-taking-razor-from-self-harming-classmate/

[Harmony Blue]

1. These school offficials

need be fired.

Just wrong on so many levels.

[Old Codger]

2. Once again

Another indication that the inmates are indeed running the asylum

[exboyfil]

3. Why do you think there is so much push for school choice

This craziness is on display in big and small ways often in school systems. From ignoring my daughter when she is trying to check out of high school to go meet with her college advisor for a project to complaining how students are bypassing the junior and senior classes at the high school in lieu of self funded college courses (an actual conversation my older daughter heard by the chair of the science department demanding that the school stop students from doing this).

[fleabiscuit]

15. IMHO, school choice has nothing to do with it.

It's about conformity. Our education systems stifle and weed out the nonconformist. Public schools are also under assault for funding, fighting private charter schools and even each other, usually disguised as helping students get ahead.

[steve2470]

4. such a bad decision nt

[rurallib]

5. no good deed shall go unpunished

[Baitball Blogger]

6. Bad precedent.

[malthaussen]

7. Would be useful if the article mentioned why she was suspended.

What is the school's rationale for this silly ruling?

-- Mal

[philosslayer]

8. Zero tolerance

She handled a weapon (a razor) in school. Many schools have zero tolerance rules.

[malthaussen]

9. Well, no wonder I couldn't figure it out, then.

She threw a razor blade in the trash, and that constitutes "handling a weapon." I never would have imagined.

-- Mal

[FarCenter]

10. She learned a valuable lesson -- keep your mouth shut.

[Treant]

13. If she were my daughter

She'd learn another valuable lesson: goodness has its rewards.

"So, Sally, would you like to visit the amusement park, water park (OK, it's March and unpleasant, so those would have to wait), go shopping, get extra ice cream and skip dinner, or something else special during your days off?"

Also, shopping. The young lady did this at some minor risk to herself but still did the right thing and helped a classmate.

[Jackpine Radical]

11. Wow. This is nuts.

Did anybody focus on the cutter? Or were they all so eager to punish the Good Samaritan that they ignored the real problem here? Without getting into too much speculation, it's a pretty sure bet that the kid with the razor has some serious emotional issues.

[deutsey]

12. A similar zero-tolerance instance of stupidity

The incident occurred during a Friday night home football game on Sept. 13 when David realized that he had forgotten to remove a hunting knife he had in his jacket pocket. He had been using the knife to help clear a wooded area near his home.

When he realized he had the knife in his pocket as he approached the school's stadium gate, he took the knife out and gave it to a security guard, who allowed David to enter the game.

Several minutes later, the high school principal, Michael Hower, came into the stands and told David he had to leave the game.

At a meeting Monday with David and his parents, school officials said their zero-tolerance policy required David to be suspended for 10 days for bringing a weapon onto school property.



Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/local/north/2013/09/20/No-expulsion-for-student-who-turned-in-knife-at-Fox-Chapel-football-game/stories/201309200187#ixzz2wVubRY8u

[South_Street]

14. Idiots abound...

[niyad]

16. welcome to du

[niyad]

17. ugh, I just read through some of the comments after the story--all the biblical reichwingnutjobs

appeared to be out in full force.

[strategery blunder]

18. This should have been a teachable moment for the school.

There are some very good reasons why throwing out a used razor used for self-cutting is a bad idea. It's far more likely to have blood on it than one used for shaving, for example, and blood is a potentially infectious substance. In a place like a school, that's a very bad thing. The razor should have been handled as medical waste.

A sixth-grader should not be expected to know that. It would have to be taught to her. The kid tried to do the right thing, likely in an environment where an attentive adult was not readily available--otherwise the adult would have been duty-bound by his/her position within the school to intervene. She might have thought the teacher was too busy, or that he could not leave the other student alone to go find a teacher. (That second possibility, especially, is disconcerting.)

We train adults to handle these contingencies. The kids aren't supposed to have to worry about these things. But for having no kind of training on what to do in this situation, other than the moral compass imparted by her parents, Adriaonna handled the situation quite well. However, an adult should have been alerted to the situation before the kid threw the razor in the trash.

But the school administrators were too braindead to use the incident for pedagogy of the above sort. Instead, they threatened to expel a student for preventing harm to another student. The result is likely at least one kid even more distrustful of authority, who might well be reticent to report these types of situations to those best equipped to handle them in the future. To say nothing of the example this incident sets for other students: "Keep your mouth shut."

[bluestateguy]

19. As a general rule, school administrators are some of the dumbest people you will ever meet

Overly fixated on rules, rules, rules and absolutely paranoid about lawsuits.

No creativity, no sense of humor and little conception of the real world.