An article I found very interesting..
 

http://shine.yahoo.com/parenting/hig...192900808.html

A quote I thought was interesting..

Gabe Rottman, legislative counsel for the ACLU, told Yahoo! Shine, adding that his office has seen an uptick in aggressive discipline in schools lately. “Not only is that punishment disproportionate to the crime, but the schools are missing out on an opportunity to teach students the value of freedom of expression.”

“In general,” Rottman said, “overly punitive disciplinary policies tend to be counterproductive to good education.”

Has anyone else had any experiences like this? I know my high school has definitely gotten very strict in the past few years that my younger brother has been there. The punishments they have for minor crimes are starting to get out of control.

I can kind of understand the drinking at prom, but not letting someone walk at graduation because they couldn't ask off work for the practice ceremony? Some jobs you simply can't get out of and some bosses are less than understanding.

Just something I found interesting!

Seems to me that most of these overzealous responses come from the perception that everything must be "fair" and thus must be held to a given standard.

Unfortunately, in our society's pursuit of "fair" we often forget to do what's "right". For one reason or another we do not allow any bend, and it's way too easy for stupid stuff to happen.

I think that it's no coincidence that this trend has happened in parallel with the devaluation of teachers/administrators as professionals in our society. If you don't trust the people in the schools to make good decisions, you have to do things like write blanket policies and not grant exceptions.

Interesting point, DeltaBetaBaby. I hadn't thought of that but I think there could definitely be a connection there.

^^ I think you're exactly right.

And let's go back to the initial post. You say "The punishments they have for minor crimes are starting to get out of control."

Wearing a feather on one's graduation cap is nowhere in the US a crime.

She showed great disrespect given that she requested a ruling and was denied, then did it anyway. Better to either not ask, or abide by the ruling, no matter how asinine it is.

The only crime I saw in the original article posted is the possible underage drinking, at this point only an allegation, I believe.

We cannot and must not allow those in power to set rules based on arbitrary criteria or on making it "easier" for the powerful to have things their way.

I guess I should have said minor offenses. I was thinking of crimes in terms of violations of a school's policy, not necessarily crimes in the "real" world.