school can discipline students at home, online behavior can be punishable too Options

[illumineering]

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Policy could let school officials discipline students at home
8/17/2005, 3:47 a.m. ET
The Associated Press

BLOOMSBURG, Pa. (AP) — Students could face discipline by school officials for things they write or say outside school under a new policy, adopted amid intense debate that left one Central Columbia school board member near tears and another predicting costly court battles.

Expression outside school that officials believe "materially and substantially" interferes with school activities can result in discipline, according to the policy.

It would help administrators deal with problems such as a student who threatens another student on a Web site while at home, Superintendent Harry Mathias said.

Board member Joseph Petruncio, who voted with a 5-3 majority in favor of the policy, compared it to rules at his old parochial school.

"You wore your uniform to and from school," Petruncio said. "And if you did anything in that uniform, even out of school, you heard about it the next day."

He said the policy could have helped a student who was verbally harassed and beaten outside of school after allegedly parking in a memorial spot for a dead classmate, and eventually skipped graduation out of fear, noting that the board took no action in that case.

The policy "says we can go a little further and I say we should," Petruncio said, adding that if that results in lawsuits, "I say bring 'em on."

Mathias said most students wouldn't notice the new rules. "It may come up once a year," he said.

But board member Barry Davis said while he considered policing student expression on school grounds justified, he objected to regulating expression at home.

"That smacks of a police state to me," Davis said, predicting that resulting legal action could cost the district millions.

Board members Deborah Creasy and Kathleen Haubert tried unsuccessfully to get the proposal reviewed in committee before it was adopted.

Creasy was nearly in tears as she read a quote saying that rather than falling to outside enemies, the nation was in danger of being "eroded bit by bit from within." She said she had called the American Civil Liberties Union about the proposal. "I hope they respond and nail this policy to the wall," she said.

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Information from: Press Enterprise, http://www.pressenterpriseonline.com

Is this a good poilcy or is it going too far? What do you think?

[*mipadi*]

The situation isn't as cut-and-dried as most of you are making it out to be. Take this situation: Student A gets in an argument with Student B (we'll say at school, but the situation works no matter where the argument is). Student B goes home and posts on his webpage that he is so mad he is going to beat Student A to a bloody pulp when he sees him at school tomorrow. Student A reads this and alerts his parents, who report it to the principal.

What is the school to do?

If the school does nothing, because the threat happened outside of school, then the school can be said to have failed to create a safe environment for its students. Of course, if the school decides to punish Student B for the remarks (ranging from something as simple as keeping Students A and B apart, to, say, detaining Student B), then the school can also be said to be infringing on Student B's rights.

I don't think schools have the jurisdiction to police students outside of school, but they do have the obligation to provide a safe learning environment; and if a situation outside of school could potentially cause a situation inside of school, then is it right to say that the school has no authority to do anything about it?

This is a somewhat complex and extreme case. In the event of cases that occur completely outside of school (such as, say, robbery of a store or possessing/selling drugs off-campus) then I would agree that schools are not obligated or authorized to take action against the student; that's the job of the police. However, I would also argue that incidents occurring outside of school would still be grounds for a private school to expel a student, just as a business could fire an employee who gets into legal trouble outside of work. (Of course, a public school doesn't have such authority, since public schools are obligated to provide an education unless a student is a disruption to the learning environment.)