Good god, the insanity never ends...

[minsue]

Woke up to this in my local paper this morning. I'm really quite curious about one thing: Are the "zero tolerance" zealots rampaging elsewhere as well or does Arizona just have an abundance of them?

Girl is suspended for inhaling helium
By Tracy Kurtinitis, Tribune


The only thing that got high was her voice.
But taking a puff off a helium-filled balloon while decorating for the Friday night junior high school dance was enough to get Hayley Hoffman, 13, suspended for five days under Gilbert Unified School District’s zero tolerance policy on inhalants.
"They said it was a drug abuse thing," said Mark Hoffman, the eighth-grade girl’s father. "They acted like she got off easy."

Her sentence was reduced to one day of outof-school suspension after Greenfield Junior High School principal Jill Bowers re-examined the circumstances. But for Hoffman, his daughter’s suspension was one day too long.

"(Hayley was) very upset and in tears," he said. "She has a 3.7 grade point average, she’s on yearbook staff, drama and the girl’s soccer team. She could have been kicked off the team. Serious consequences for inhaling helium."

District spokeswoman Dianne Bowers admitted that at first glance, "this seems a bit silly."

She was quick to point out, however, there are a lot of questions that need to be answered before jumping to conclusions.

Such as: Was she sucking the helium from a tank or from a balloon, or did someone become ill? "It is my understanding helium replaces oxygen in the lungs and in very severe cases can cause great harm," Bowers said.

A county medical official had a different assessment.

"You don’t get high from helium and it doesn’t cause any damage," said Dr. Tony Pizon, a toxicologist with Maricopa County Poison Control. "Worst case, you could pass out, but you would instantly regain consciousness."

State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne said he cringes whenever he hears the expression "zero tolerance" in schools because "it often means common sense has been removed from the equation."

Horne said although he believes in rigorous discipline, "if you go overboard, you undermine."

Horne cited incidents where students had been punished for bringing plastic knives in their lunches and a Sikh student who was suspended for bringing a ceremonial sword to school as examples of zero tolerance run amok.

But, helium — that one is new to Horne who admitted, "I used to do that when I was in high school."

Bowers said this was the first time the district had been faced with students inhaling helium and may explain why the principal was quick to suspend Hayley.

"Part of the dilemma is you have to look at every part of the case and ask why the policies are written on inhalants," Bowers said.

Bowers said the Greenfield principal initially erred on the side of caution, a decision the district stands by.

"We will always err on the side of caution when it involves student safety," she said. "We always make sure we enforce our policies, but that we do it with reason and so we look at each case individually."

And as for whether Gilbert will go the extra step and ban helium on campus, Bowers said "that’s the question behind the question."

"There is no way of answering that at this point," she said.

Are people this insane elsewhere?

 

[R. Richard]

Woke up to this in my local paper this morning. I'm really quite curious about one thing: Are the "zero tolerance" zealots rampaging elsewhere as well or does Arizona just have an abundance of them?

Are people this insane elsewhere?

It is probably a case of stupidity, rather than insanity. The person who suspended her probably did not know that helium is an inert gas. Thus, the person doing the suspending figured that it was something like sniffing glue.

 

[shereads]

Re: Re: Good god, the insanity never ends...

It is probably a case of stupidity, rather than insanity. The person who suspended her probably did not know that helium is an inert gas. Thus, the person doing the suspending figured that it was something like sniffing glue.

Worse: it looked fun.

 

[lucky-E-leven]

A year or two ago in Dallas, a kid got the same suspension for having a knife in the bed of his pickup truck.

So after they put him through all kinds of questioning and other shit, we find out that he's the leader of the youth group at school/church (wherever) and did a massive collection and drop-off at the local CCA (Christian Community Action) and the knife fell out of a box of donations.



A huge, dull cake knife. Trust me, you can get hurt far worse in Dallas (especially South Dallas) schools simply by getting off the bus.

~lucky

 

[dr_mabeuse]

The whole US has become a terribly fear-filled place.

Everything seems driven by fear these days. I don't remember everyone being so frightened of everything when I was growing up.

---dr.M.

 

[The_old_man]

It is all the result of "The War On Drugs" and the induced National Paranoia.

 

[ABSTRUSE]

We used to huff helium behind the school, it's was all fine and good until one of us floated off, never to be seen or heard from again.

 

[SummerMorning]

It's grotesque.

 

[cheerful_deviant]

It's grotesque.

I was thinking asinine, but grotesque works just as well.

 

[SummerMorning]

One eye blind tunnel vision?

 

[cantdog]

Youth is terror.

 

[Edward Teach]

Sometimes there is more to the story than gets reported

Lexington, NC 1996

A kiss on a girl's cheek had severe consequences for Jonathan Prevett, a first grader in Lexington, N.C. He was suspended from school because of sexual harassment. The school thinks this action was justified. Jonathan's mother is outraged. She could understand if older students were accused of sexual harassment, but in her son's case the school overreacted. After all, Jonathan only kissed another six year old on the cheek after she had asked him to do so in order to prove his friendship to her.
"A six-year old kissing a six-year old is inappropriate behavior, no matter how old they are," explains Jane Martin, spokesperson for the school. These rules can be found in a rule book that every student received at the beginning of the school year. The principal has a written statement of all parents in which they confirm that they have explained to their children in detail what is and is not allowed in school. These rules will make kids think twice whether or not they are allowed to hug someone, argues Jonathan's mother. "No wonder there are so many sick people out there."

__________________________________________________

This incident was caused by a system wide policy written to conform to federal guidelines, which were subsequently changed as a result of this case, that could have caused the school system to be denied much needed federal funds.

The child was suspended for one day. It drew national attention but the Superintendent of Schools had little choice but to enforce the rules. He not only faced the possible loss of federal funds, but also the threat of lawsuits from the parents of high school students previously suspended under the same rule for "unwanted touching."

Ed

 

[cantdog]

There is so much to say about these things that it leaves me speechless for a place to begin. House apes. You gotta love 'em, but they can't be trusted to blow their own nose even with a manual.

Plain Talk

by William Jay Smith

"There are people so dumb," my father said,
"That they don't know beans from an old bedstead.
They can't tell one thing from another,
Ella Cinders from Whistler's Mother,
A porcupine quill from a peacock feather,
A buffalo-flop from Florentine leather.
Meatless shanks boiled bare and blue,
They bob up and down like bones in a stew;
Don't know their arse from a sassafras root,
And couldn't pour piss from a rawhide boot
With complete instructions on the heel."

That's how he felt. That's how I feel.

 

[McKenna]

The whole US has become a terribly fear-filled place.

I hate that in some cases, (not necessarily this one,) we let this fear run our lives and dictate our decisions; in that respect, the terrorist have won, their objective has been met: We're terrified.



(Maybe I should have posted this in Boxlicker's thread.)

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

People are stupid, especially people in an authority position in a school system.

Parents complaining, declining budgets, and the insanity of a school filled with people in the tumultuous time of teenagehood combine to make Administrators so deftly paranoid of everything that things as stupid as this happen. I think all administrators should be forced to use marijuana to calm them down and give them something to blame when their asinine shit hits the fan.

 

[cantdog]

To answer the question, expressly (it is certainly implied in the way the responses have been cast): yes. "Zero Tolerance" nonsense has been cropping up periodically since Reagan articulated the phrase in an apotheosis of meanness. It now takes the cherished place in the language once filled by "cracking down." Cracking down was always just as counterproductive, and just as void of common sense.

If you start out by saying, "I know! Ooh! Ooh! Let's just throw judgement out the window before we do anything relating to this!" and then the authority figures reply, "Wow! Inspired idea!" it simply reinforces contempt for authority. It might also cause a number of epically stupid things to happen to random victims, too; if it doesn't, that fortunate turn of events isn't the fault of the people cracking down with their zero tolerance.

And they almost never go back and fix it, even when cooler heads are prevailing.

There are some real bozos in charge of justice. They seem to be satisfied if they just get to throw their weight around.

 

[minsue]

"I know! Ooh! Ooh! Let's just throw judgement out the window before we do anything relating to this!"

ROFLMAO


Thanks, I needed a good giggle this morning.

 

[SensualCealy]

In our kids school when the zero tolerancey went in to place, the little kids all the way up to gr 8 were not to hold hands! This was rediculous, why can't a child of the age of 3-6 be able to hold hands, they all do it, mostly little girls. Who is it going to hurt. but its still a hands off policy!
Come on people , lets use better judgement!
SC

 

[SummerMorning]

Re: Sometimes there is more to the story than gets reported

"A six-year old kissing a six-year old is inappropriate behavior, no matter how old they are," explains Jane Martin,

Can a six-year old be ten years old?

 

[Somme]

Re: Re: Re: Good god, the insanity never ends...

Worse: it looked fun.

<.......is getting the giggles......>

 

[Colleen Thomas]

There is an old saying, perhaps appliccable here.

People will rise to the level of their incompetance.

When you are a principal or leader in a school and don't know that there is no high from helium and the only side effect is talking like Donald Duck for a short period, you shouldn't be there.

You see this everywhere, day in and day out, administrators and managers who can't do what those they supervise do and are ignorant of even what they do.

I worked for the phonce co. I got an order, to take a line to someone's house, then remove the line from another house where it had been active. I had been working there maybe 2 weeks. My foreman wrote me up, and was ready to gig me, because he had showed up at the house while I was still on the clock on that job and I wasn't there.

It took the shop steward, two techs, and his boss to make the pin head understand that I was still on the job, but halfway across town taking out the old line. He couldn't even read a work order.

-Colly