3rd-Grader Busted For Jolly Rancher Possession

theodp writes "A third-grader in a small Texas school district received a week's detention for merely possessing a Jolly Rancher. Leighann Adair, 10, was eating lunch Monday when a teacher confiscated the candy. Her parents said she was in tears when she arrived home later that afternoon and handed them the detention notice. But school officials are defending the sentence, saying the school was abiding by a state guideline that banned 'minimal nutrition' foods. 'Whether or not I agree with the guidelines, we have to follow the rules,' said school superintendent Jack Ellis."

Comments

More "zero tolerance" idiocy

[Vinegar Joe]

From our so-called educators.

Re:More "zero tolerance" idiocy

[courteaudotbiz]

I would add that this law is totally invading the right of the person to eat whatever he/she wants! Who are they to tell me NOT to eat a pack of Jolly Rancher? Or to tell my kid that I should not let him/her eat this crap occasionnaly?

When did the Jolly Ranchers become illegal and subject to be excluded from school?

Re:More "zero tolerance" idiocy

[eln]

This is "zero tolerance" done the wrong way. If we're going to go zero tolerance, we need to go all the way. Upon discovery of the illicit candy, she should have been summarily executed on the spot.

Seriously though, a week detention for candy? How about starting with a polite note home to the parents explaining the policy? All a detention will do is set up an adversarial relationship where the parents will fight the school on everything they try to do from now on.

Re:More "zero tolerance" idiocy

[toastar]

If you want to attend FREE school, you absolutely must abide by the state/district policies. Don't like it? You have a choice: Private school. Actually, there's another choice: Home school.

Yes, this policy is being abused, no it should not go this far, probably there's some subtext here not being reported (like continuous pastern of this issue, and singling out a particular student as an example). Possibly, this could even be an attempt explicitly to GET notice, so the law gets CHANGED! Very often, the best way to see a law overturned is to actually enforce the letter of the law, even if you don't agree with it, as doing so would actually create enough news and yelling that the law can be changed.

My wife's school has a pretty touch nutrition program. Nothing sold in the cafe is "questionable" on a nutrition standpoint. kids can't buy snacks unless they've already both bought and EATEN their meal (they have to get a pass from the cafeteria aide before they can enter a snack line). Snacks are limited to relatively healthy items, but things like chips are available, but again, only if the meal was actually eaten... Candy is not sold by the cafe, but it is available from teachers as a positive reward system. Parents are cautioned not to send certain snacks (especially candy) to the school, but kids can not be directly punished for it (a not is sent home the first few times, and contraband is confiscated if its a continuing problem).

What IS important to note: The PARENTS can actually get in some hot water if they're failing to either send a nutritious lunch, pay for a meal plan, or get on an "assisted" lunch program (for those having trouble affording it). They handle this by checking what kids are eating, and if the school feels the lunch is "dramatically poor" in nutritional quality, the kid is made to buy a meal at the cafe, and the parents get a bi-monthly bill for those meals. i.e. send you kid to lunch with some low-grade snack-as-a-meal, or fail to send one at all, and the parent is not only out the cost of what they sent (which likely will be thrown out by faceteria staff) but they get a bill for the meal the kid did eat. Failure to pay that bill (or get on an assistance or free lunch program for those that qualify) leads to added fees, late charges, and eventually collections (in the form of you kid can not return to the school until you pay, or fill out forms to get on a program).

Every kid that goes to public school in 8th grade and lower here is essentially guaranteed a good meal, regardless of who's paying for it. You would be flabbergasted at how many parents send their kids to school with little or no food and no money, and who would otherwise have NO ISSUES financially getting them a good meal. Many are simply lazy, others seem to not give a shit. The state has a responsibility to get involved. I'd much rather it be this way, including continual documentation of the neglect to provide a good meal, eventually leading to a DSS visit at home to find out why, and in the meantime the kid doesn't suffer...

banning candy (and sodas and other such pure sugar content items), is essentially done exclusively such that those can be used as positive rewards in other ways. Ensuring lunch actually includes basic nutrition (whether it be vegan, vegetarian, or other, many standard easily apply to what is and is not a fulling and nutritious lunch), that is important.

Fuck you and your WOT.

If it's my kid, Then I set the rules. Period the end.

I think in this situation the parent should decide the punishment if any. And I sure expect the parent to be able to over turn the detention, if they thought it appropriate.

Re:More "zero tolerance" idiocy

[ImNotAtWork]

Please do not say children have no rights in schools, it is patently incorrect to spread that view. That view gets us into situations like that one girl who was stripped searched and made to expose herself to a nurse during the search for a tylenol.

"Students do not shed their constitutional rights when they enter the school house doors." -Tinker v. Desmoines

Re:More "zero tolerance" idiocy

[Talonius]

You're obviously not a parent. Or any sort of individual responsible for teaching a child. My child, my rules -- consistency is one of the key issues with parenting, and having those rules undermined and changed on a whim because of a school administrator only serves to subvert the authority of the parent -- a fragile entity at any point in a child's life.

The government is stepping way over the line with parenting - constantly. The GP's reply was succinct and to the point - they're my children, my problem. Until schools allow us to divert our tax dollars to a private school and until school officials are not public officials they do not have the right to dictate to me what my children do. Just in case you missed it -- they work for us. Me. They're not an untouchable entity to which I must bow and scrape.

One example: my wife buys food for my son to take to school. He doesn't like it, so he doesn't pack it. He goes to school and ends up skipping lunch. The food's there -- but in your world the government billing us for him to eat what the school provides is just dandy. We can't force him to take his lunch -- take away their food, you go to jail. Take away their freedom, you go to jail. Take away their game system, you go to jail. The government is making parents into individuals who have all the responsibilities but none of the power -- while conveniently ignoring their own continuing abuse of powers.

The "letter of the law" is not intended to be zero tolerance. These teachers and principals and other officials always claim they're following the letter of the law, but police officers let speeders off with a warning every day -- or ignore the jay walkers -- or the people in the financial industry routinely flipping the SEC the bird while they manipulate away billions of our dollars. Claiming the "letter of the law" is being followed is just an excuse to piss on the individual on question, and not even bother to call it rain.

With the way the world is going we're all going to burn in the next century; that fire may be religious, or indignant, or nuclear in nature -- I don't know.

"People should not fear their government, their government should fear the people."
"There is no justice. There is no balance. Violence isn't the last resort; it's the only resort."

Kids today.

[Petersko]

In my day we managed to carry around weed and not get caught. The fact that she got caught with a Jolly Rancher proves what I suspect - kids today are a little slower, mentally speaking.

Learning to get away with stuff is vital to the developmental process. I see a sad future where the adults of tomorrow are too stupid to run a decent ponzi scheme, and all the good ones are owned by foreigners.

This is Not all Bad News

[skywire]

This third grader, her parents and those who read the story are learning a valuable lesson about the nature of the state.

Re:This is Not all Bad News

[Buelldozer]

This article, and many more like it, prove the existence of a growing "Nanny State.". I often read people dismissing "Slippery Slope" arguments but here is a real life example.

Someone passed a guideline to try and help children eat healthier and suddenly children are being punished for possessing a piece of candy.

It doesn't take a genius to see how this is going to play out in other realms such as healthcare and finance. After all, the bureaucratic morons running the schools are essentially the same bureaucratic morons that you'll find doing the administrative work in local, state, and federal governments.

No, not all of the administrators in a school or the government are morons. Many of them are intelligent and capable people. The problem is that they're outnumbered by the morons.

This just in: Hypoglycemic child dies...

[razathorn]

while walking home from school after teacher implements zero tolerance policy and confiscates condition-regulating candy.

I suppose it would take something terrible like the hypothetical situation above to put tolerance back into the system.

Not My Child You Don't...

[blcamp]

If this EVER happend to my kid, I would be down at this principal's office, telling him to shove thier policy up their ass sideways and my son would absolutely not be serving any detention over a friggin' piece of candy.

They want to press? I'll be pressing buttons on the phone for my lawyer and the local newsmedia myself. Legal nightmare, PR nightmare, financial nightmare... they'll have all of that for sure.

Liars

[Jer]

saying the school was abiding by a state guideline that banned 'minimal nutrition' foods. 'Whether or not I agree with the guidelines, we have to follow the rules,' said school superintendent Jack Ellis."

Except that the state guideline is intended to restrict what the school provides to students, not what students bring into the school themselves. It's about making sure that the school is meeting nutritional requirements in the lunches it provides and not that it's taking state and federal funding dollars to provide the students with pizza bought from the Domino's franchise owned by the principal's brother. It's actually explicit even in the linked article without having to read the linked statute, and the administrators dance around it as "well the parent didn't provide it - it came from another student". Still didn't come from the school - still not covered by the law.

The school administrators making this claim are either idiots or liars. They could, I suppose, be idiots - plenty of idiots get moved into administration positions where they can do less harm to students than in front of a chalkboard. But it's more likely that they're liars who think that if they "blame the government" they can divert attention away from themselves. They don't want candy in school? That's fine - when I was a kid the administrators at my elementary school had the same rule. But they didn't try to pretend like they were conforming to some fictional government requirement to restrict candy in the school. They just said "no candy in school" and that was that. And if the parents had a problem with it they could bring it up at the school board meeting and get the school board to change the policy.

Re:RTFA

[TheReij]

I don't see where getting it from a friend is any different from bringing it from home. It's a freakin' piece of candy. I'm from Texas and this is just stupid.

Whoosh LOL XD

[Tetsujin]

+4, +3 Insightful? Wow Mods, whoosh. This is funny. Your lack of noticing the tongue-in-cheek comment is even funnier.

Sometimes it's funnier to mod a funny post "insightful". It's a way of drawing even more attention to the comment in an even more serious light - which makes undercutting this with humor even more effective...

Granted, it's sort of an abuse of the moderation system, but, god damn it, just because someone reacts differently to a joke than you did does not mean they didn't get it! I'm sick of "whoosh", people overuse it and misuse it all the time.

Re:Whoosh LOL XD

[228e2]

WHOOSH!!!!

Re:What were the parents thinking ?

[norminator]

I would imagine that the "provided by parents" clause was intended to mean "not provided by the school", and the letter of the law is being over-vigorously enforced. In any case, somebody's parent probably provided the candy to their own student, who passed it along to the "guilty" girl. The school really shouldn't care where the candy came from as long as the school didn't give it to her.

I also thought this part of the article was interesting:

Ellis said school officials had decided a stricter punishment was necessary after lesser penalties failed to serve as a deterrent.

How extreme do the punishments have to be before the powers that be realize that the rule sucks? Maybe deterring is pointless? I understand that Fast Food Nation and Supersize Me are bringing things to public awareness, and in general it's a good thing if the schools increase the nutritional quality of what they provide to the kids, but to try to take away a kid's right to choose whether she's going to eat a tiny piece of long-lasting candy is borderline insane. Rule makers, educators and legistlators: Please stop making new rules just to try to make things "better", when there are much better ways for you to spend your time.

Also, one other question: Do parents get to provide any feedback on this rule?

And then they're surprised...

[demon driver]

... when every couple of years one of the not-so-well-adjusted kids gets himself a gun and makes them pay. As far as I'm concerned, actually I'm surprised that it's only one of them every couple of years.

Re:RTFA

[MyLongNickName]

I'm from Texas and this is just stupid.

Well... you said it, not me.

Re:Not her parents...

[c6gunner]

Thanks man ... next time someone asks me why I oppose the criminalization of drugs, I'll just point them to that article. Sometimes reality provides it's own parody.

Re:What were the parents thinking ?

[AndersOSU]

"Zero tolerance" is code for "I don't want to have to think critically," or "my staff is too unprofessional to avoid favoritism."

Thus, the only people who think zero tolerance is a good idea are inept managers, administrators and politicians.

Re:What were the parents thinking ?

[OnlineAlias]

"Zero tolerance is for things like, violence, gun possesion, possesion of drugs, harassment, cheating, etc, etc."

You are doing exactly what parent is criticizing, and for exactly the same reason. Violence (self defense), gun possession (BB Gun, toys), possession of drugs (OTC, prescription, etc), harassment (online? name calling?), cheating (plagiarism, failed footnote).

You really, really need to rethink.

Re:RTFA

[gantzm]

> Instead of banning hard candies, ban making messes and punish those who do.
Nope, can't do that, see the gun control debate...