by Angela Donlon-Gatchell

Created on: March 30, 2010

The zero tolerance rule implemented in the public school system needs to be revised to allow school officials to practice discretionary decision making. Some examples related to this situation are very obvious. As it stands right now, there is a young boy in kindergarten who is in isolation or in-school suspension because his hair rides below the collar line. At other times, there are children being handcuffed and arrested for having a food fight at school or scribbling on their desks. If the children are tardy to school or their classes they are issued tickets and the repeat offenders are taken into juvenile court and given a record. These offenses do require attention from the school officials but not from our police departments and judicial system. The children are humiliated in front of their teachers and their peers, and as a result of this, children are now dismissing school as a joke and are starting to drop out.

As you can see, this policy is not necessary in every situation. Zero tolerance has adopted the “arrest first policy” (Langber, & Brege, 2009,) which has eliminated practical procedures conducted by school officials to solve minor issues. The consequences of this action are overcrowding of the juvenile courts, long suspensions, alienation, and more advanced criminal activities (Chen, 2010). Others in the school system and law enforcement agree changes need to be made. Our elementary school students are being disciplined as if they were gang members. This rule was adopted throughout the United States because of the devastating shootings at Columbine and Virginia Tech. In the New York Times article titled “It’s a fork, it’s a spoon, it’s a…weapon?” the author brings up the same question I had:  “Why do school officials not have more discretion in such cases?” He also addresses the defense on the side of the school officials: “…it is difficult to distinguish innocent pranks and mistakes from more serious threats, and that the police must be strict to protect students” (Urbina, 2009).

 The Virginia Youth Violence Project (2009) conducted studies in a controlled environment regarding “violence prevention”. The conclusion was to provide training for all school staff members in a six hour workshop teaching techniques in threat assessment. In other words, they were taught how to recognize and discipline in cases such as bullying and teasing. This

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