Zero Tolerance Bullying Withers Under Scrutiny
Zero Tolerance is a festering mold that's destroyed when its putrid nature is exposed to the disinfecting power of the sun.We saw that festering mold destroyed this past week here in Central Indiana, after an outrageous suspension of more than 50 high school students was lifted, following protests, laser-guided media scrutiny, and national mockery of the situation.
This past Tuesday, in the town of Clayton, west of Indianapolis, six Cascade High School students were suspended after a prank of decorating their school with 11,000 Post-It Notes the previous night.
District superintendent Patrick Spray, who has apparently forgotten what it was like to be in high school, was outraged — OUTRAGED! — that students would pull such a prank. So he suspended the kids, including the valedictorian, salutatorian, and senior class president, for trespassing, entering the school without permission, and for being unsupervised while on school grounds.
Actually that's not true, said the students. They got permission and a key from a school board member, who's also one of the students' mother. And they were supervised by a school janitor, who's also the mother of one of the students.
Oh really? said Spray, and then fired the janitor, Kim Rouse.
Dude, it's Post-It Notes. It's 11,000 Post-It Notes that the kids paid for themselves. They even made sure to pull a prank that wouldn't damage school property. It sounds like he was just upset because he looked like an idiot when the kids pointed out that they never actually violated those rules.
The following day, after 57 more students peacefully protested the suspensions, Spray realized he overstepped his bounds and behaved irrationally, so he apologized to everyone, and promised Rouse she could have her job back.
Just kidding. He suspended every protestor. And with 460 students in the high school, Spray — an education professional who probably uses phrases like "disrupting the educational process" — disrupted the educational process of more than 10 per cent of his students, thus ensuring the rest of the school wouldn't pay attention either.
Even on my best day as a fourth grader, I could only disrupt the educational process of 20 other kids. This guy managed to do it to an audience 23 times the size of mine with slightly less dramatic histrionics. Trés impressive.
Because if there's one lesson we want to teach our children, it's that the only way you can assert your power is to be a petty little tyrant who throws a big hissy fit when he's made to look like a bigger idiot than he was the day before.
But bullies, like festering molds, cannot stand the harsh sunlight of public scrutiny and awareness. And as the outrage grew, and a lot of media people and concerned parents began to ask a lot of uncomfortable questions — like "Really?" and "Don't you think that's a bit much?" — Spray backtracked, and lifted the suspension of the Post-It Six. He also removed the suspension from their academic records, and they were allowed to return to class.
He was originally going to reduce the suspension of the remaining protestors from two days to one, and let them serve it during school. But by Thursday, Spray said he would vacate their suspensions as well, and the suspensions would not be placed on their academic records either.
Do you remember that scene in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, when Principal Rooney was facing complete and utter failure to catch Bueller skipping school, and instead had to ride the bus home with a bunch of mouth-breathing kids?
Yeah, I'll bet it was kind of like that for Spray. I can't imagine the bitterness he had to swallow when he met with the concerned parents who thought he was a bullying little tyrant overstepping the bounds of decency and sanity.
Spray has said he will still recommend to the board that they fire Kim Rouse, the janitor, but from all reports, the board has indicated they won't go along with that, which will be one more feather in Spray's Big Cap O' Failure.
While all hindsight is 20/20, it looks like Spray should have just forced a grudging smile, lectured the kids about respect for property, and let them clean up the mess, like they originally offered. Then none of this would have ever happened.
Instead, for the next several years, Patrick Spray will be remembered as the Zero Tolerance despot who was beaten by a small group of thoughtful, committed high school kids who did the one thing that many schools still don't teach:
To stand up to bullies on behalf of those who can't.
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