ZT Nightmare At Forte Junior High - Azle, TX

Here is another great example of over zealous and very unenlightened public school administration at its worse. From the sounds of it this young man (Clay) wasn't accorded any due process at all. But then again our public schools no longer feel the need to teach by example the cornerstones of justice and liberty that our nation was founded on. They are looking for simple minded, cheap, politically expedient solutions regardless of who gets hurt in the process (much less worrying about whether there is any evidence that ZT works (which there isn't!)). Vouchers are sounding better every day!

Wendy's Story :

My 12 year old son was suspended Friday for 3 days and given 45 days at an alternative school because of the no tolerance policy.

I was phoned by the Vice Principal Thursday and told that my son had been overheard by his PE teacher saying "I wonder what would happen if someone brought a gun to school". The Vice Principal was calling to inform me that he was sending him to an alternative school because they had a zero tolerance policy. He also preceeded to tell me that my son had been difficult by not giving him my work number or my husbands work number, and said that Clay was intentially not giving him my number to try and stay out of trouble. I told him that my son, Clay, did not know my and my husbands work number and that I had put my work number on all of the papers at the beginning of school multiple times and asked why he didn't just look it up. He than replied
" well that isn't the issue now is it. Your son is going to an alternative school and if you don't like it your choice is to take him out of the district." (Well it seemed to be one of the issues when he was accusing him of lying". Needless to say, I was shocked.

My son had never so much as had even a fight. I told the Vice Principal that I would like to meet with the teacher and my son to get to the bottom of the issue. The Vice Principal told me that I couldn't speak to the teacher and that I needed to be at a meeting at 8:30 am the next morning to find out how long he would be suspended and sent to the alternative school... And OH MY GOD... HOW DID THIS GET TO THIS POINT!!!!

I went and picked my son up from school. He was sitting in the office crying. They had a policeman question him (without me) like a criminal and use scare tactics. He was very fightened. What happened to civil rights???

I spoke with Clay and got his side of the story. He said that he forgot his gym suit that day and so him and another kid were playing cops and robbers. Using their fingers and saying bang bang, etc... He said that the other kid said what do you think would happen if someone brought a gun to school here. Clay said that they had been talking earlier about the 6 yr old that shot the 3 yr old. He said that the teacher than yelled across the room clay that's not funny go to the office. He said ok. He thought she was mad because they were goofing off. The Vice Principal supposedly questioned the other kid and teacher and they both say that Clay said it. Clay swears he did not say it.

I told Clay that even if he did say it that I would understand because I know that he wouldn't hurt anyone. I told him that it was an inappropriate conversation in this day and time at school because of the Columbine shootings and explained why. He said "mommy I swear I didn't say that!! Why
won't they believe me and let me go back to school!?!? I don't want to go to another school. (With him knowing that I'm not going to be mad at him, why would he lie to me?)

MY husband and I went to the meeting the next morning with the Principal and Vice Principal. I was hoping that the teacher would be there and we could get this whole thing straightened out. She was not present, even with me asking for her to be there the previous day.

I wanted Clay to be able to tell her his side of the story so that she could determine if she could have misheard the conversation or have thought Clay was the one who said it. I told the two Principles that I didn't believe the teacher was lying either, I just thought there was confusion somewhere. They said "this is not a trial and we won't bring her in". I said it's not worth a couple of minutes of your time to call her in? They said no. That this meeting was to talk about punishment not the facts of the previous days events. I said so your not even going to give us an opportunity to clear this up? Your saying that there's no way she could have been mistaken. They said no.

They gave him 45 days in the alternative school and suspended him for 3 days. Granted, I'm a mother who wants only the best for her child, but I don't see how any adult can be that unfair to a child and justify it by saying that their job is to protect the other 400 students not my 1. What happend to taking care, to the best of your abilities, all of their students?

My son has no violent history. He's very mellow and quite. What has the world come to when because of televised horror stories like Columbine that students have all of their constitutional rights taken from them in the sake of trying to squash crazy people. I signed the student handbook on punishment, but thought that our school officials would use common-sense and that they were there to protect our children, to hurt them. If my child was running around dressed in black each day, picking fights, I could see them utilizing the policy. Where's common sense?

Sincerely,

Wendy