Having just recently (within the last 7 years) finished public schooling, I can say that telling an official that you "accidentally" brought the gun to school is gonna land you in prison until your parents come to get you, followed by a long term suspention or expulsion.
Know what causes such unbelievable behavior from authority figures at school?
"I hope they make an example out of them."
You're upset because it happened at your school, I can understand that, and most people here probably can. But from what I've read, the altercation took place off school grounds, with a fake gun, in a perfectly legal situation. If you pause to look at it that way, the punishment that fits here is maybe a "Discretion talk" where the kids are shown how dangerous toy guns can be if they are mistaken.
Here's a fun story from high school:
I went to Eldorado High School in Albuquerque. Manzano High School was about 8 blocks away. During lunch one day, some kids had a bb gun, unloaded, sitting on the dash of their car. The Manzano principal saw the gun, demanded that the kids show him the gun (this was on the road, at a red light, btw). When the kids showed him the gun (making the dumb mistake where they point it at the principal since they have zero real gun awareness, and they know its fake while the principal doesn't), the principal flips out, runs the red light and high tails it back to Manzano where he calls the police.
The police go into Eldorado High School and grab the kids out of class (I was in Newspaper class at the time and had to run across campus with a photographer to get the story). I get there in time to hear the policemen tell the kid "You picked the wrong person to threaten with that gun."
One kid gets expelled from Eldorado and winds up finishing at an alternative school where the pregnant teens and druggies and convicts go to school, and the other just dropped out after being suspended for the rest of the semester and forfeiting all of his grades, and last I heard is an amazing druggie. Both kids were honor roll students at Eldorado.
The true story came out by the Manzano principal later the next year, when he came to Eldorado to tell the story of why toy guns are dangerous. He explained that he told the police that they pointed the gun at him, he knew that it was a toy and he was planning on making an example out of them. He had to be escorted from the school grounds when half of the kids in the gymnasium decided they were gonna kick his ass. Had it not been for APS Police Officer Norlander, who was one of the armed police officers stationed at each of the Albuquerque Public Schools, I suspect that the Manzano principal would have been horribly beaten, if not worse.
And he would have deserved it too, since he destroyed two good kids lives to prove a point.
I can relate to this some. There are some really great teachers and administrators out there. But there are quite a few not so great ones. Most of my teachers I did not mind. Some were completely unreasonable though and would refuse to ever listen to what you were trying to say.
I have never been in any sort of trouble. I've never been arrested nor have I ever been involved with much of anything. For the most part I minded my own business growing up, worked, and constantly tried to make money. I've never drank--I've never touched a cigarette--not once. I've been around people that smoke pot--but I've never touched it. All in all I was a pretty decent high school student.
The prinicipal of the high school I attended seemed to enjoy targeting some people. I never really understood it--some of them caused trouble--and some of them didn't. I was working a little over 40 hours per week and going to school. There was never a day where I didn't have either work or school to go to.
I'm not sure what exactly sparked the conflict I had with the principal but if I recall it was due to an unreasonable teacher. The class was some sort of cooking class that was required. We had to cook some type of food in a group. I'm not really a picky eater. I will eat about anything. That of course is if it is clean. A few people in this group were barely contious as they were pretty much always completely high and I don't think they ever knew was a shower was. Life to them was skateboarding and smoking pot. Well since this project involved using your hands to make this stuff plus they didn't bother to wash their hands. I didn't eat it. The teacher noticed that I didn't eat the food and demanding that I eat it. I told her I made it with the group and that was going to be as far as this went. I was not going to eat it. Not only that I hated whatever it was anyways. She told me to go talk to the principal.
I went to the principal and he told me that I was required by state law to eat the food. I asked him to produce this law. He of course got really offended that I didn't beleive him (since obviously he was lieing). After that he proceeded to try and call my parents. They told him they wouldn't be coming as it was a waste of their time. He told me to return to class, eat it, and come in for Saturday school.
There was only so much of a fight I could put up as a high school student. But I was stubborn. I made it very clear that I wouldn't be coming to this Saturday school as it was completely unjustified plus I would lose my job and I *had* to have the money. My parents repeated the same thing to the principal and he said that if I didn't come I was suspended.
I thought this suspension thing was kind of neat. I didn't have to come to school and the reasonable teachers didn't seem to mind it. Hell they agreed with me. So it was a pattern. After my suspension I would return to school. I'd catch up in most of my classes. That one teacher would tell me I had to eat the food. I'd say no--and I'd get another week off of school. Sometimes it would be some other thing that would give the principal a reason. Now what *really* ****ed the principal off was when every one of my other classes passed me.
He called me to his office again, this time I noticed there was a police officer sitting there. He told me that I was guility of truancy and the principal then asked me to sign a piece of paper which stated that I had not came to school under my will. I told him no and he said that I *HAD* to. I again said no and went home.
At this point I reached a point in my life where I was extremely frustrated. I needed money, I was working constantly, and I was attempting to get this damned high school thing out of the way. I wasn't sure how to deal with the whole school situation. So the next day I went and got a tour of the alternative school. As Nick stated they are generally full of druggies and criminals. The rules there were extremely strict and that didn't look very appealing to me either.
I was not capable of fighting the principal anymore and my parents were not willing. I reviewed Minnesota law and discovered under the permission of my parents I could withdraw from school at 16 years of age. That's what I did.
Yeah. This guy really made my life a pain in the ass. But I wouldn't say getting kicked out of school means that your life is destroyed. You are still perfectly capable of making anything out of yourself. I have not been held back by these series of events and I wouldn't change any of it. I discovered real quick that this is a world of *******s.
That principal has had groups of parents attempt to have him terminated several times. Multiple newspaper articles. The previous school district he came from terminated him. He's just not a very good guy.
The public education system has some major flaws and zero tolerance feeds it. I do feel that some real power hungry idiots tend to go into the system. I'm not saying *ALL* teachers are terrible--That's just not true. I'm saying that there are some terrible ones out there.
