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So, for my Ethics, Legal Issues, and Classroom Management class, one of our biggest projects is an Inquiry Project in which we take a debateable issue and poke around in it. Present both sides, etc. So I'm doing mine on Zero Tolerance Policies in Schools.
A quote from one of the articles I will be using:
"Zero tolerance" is the phrase that describes America's response to student misbehavior. Zero tolerance means that a school will automatically and severely punish a student for a variety of infractions. While zero tolerance began as a Congressional response to students with guns, gun cases are the smallest category of school discipline cases. Indeed, zero tolerance covers the gamut of student misbehavior, from including "threats" in student fiction to giving aspirin to a classmate. Zero tolerance has become a one-size-fits-all solution to all the problems that schools confront. It has redefined students as criminals, with unfortunate consequences.
- American Bar Association
Essentially, there is a set punishment for such things as bringing weapons to school (or even things that look like weapons, such as toy guns) or possessing illegal substances, making threats, attacking a student or member of the faculty or staff, etc., and it does not take into account extenuating circumstances or who it is that committed the infraction. The honor roll student would be given the same punishment for having drugs in his locker as the slacker druggie would.
But what do you think?
Poll Zero Tolerance for Zero Tolerance?
So, for my Ethics, Legal Issues, and Classroom Management class, one of our biggest projects is an Inquiry Project in which we take a debateable issue and poke around in it. Present both sides, etc. So I'm doing mine on Zero Tolerance Policies in Schools.
A quote from one of the articles I will be using:
"Zero tolerance" is the phrase that describes America's response to student misbehavior. Zero tolerance means that a school will automatically and severely punish a student for a variety of infractions. While zero tolerance began as a Congressional response to students with guns, gun cases are the smallest category of school discipline cases. Indeed, zero tolerance covers the gamut of student misbehavior, from including "threats" in student fiction to giving aspirin to a classmate. Zero tolerance has become a one-size-fits-all solution to all the problems that schools confront. It has redefined students as criminals, with unfortunate consequences.
- American Bar Association
Essentially, there is a set punishment for such things as bringing weapons to school (or even things that look like weapons, such as toy guns) or possessing illegal substances, making threats, attacking a student or member of the faculty or staff, etc., and it does not take into account extenuating circumstances or who it is that committed the infraction. The honor roll student would be given the same punishment for having drugs in his locker as the slacker druggie would.
But what do you think?
Poll Zero Tolerance for Zero Tolerance?