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Florida Teen Expelled and Arrested For Science Experiment
First time accepted submitter ruhri writes "A 16 year-old girl in Florida not only has been expelled from her high school but also is being charged as an adult with a felony after replicating the classic toilet-bowl cleaner and aluminum foil experiment. This has quite a number of scientists and science educators up in arms. The fact that she's African American and that the same assistant state attorney has decided not to charge a white teenager who accidentally killed his brother with a BB gun has some thinking whether this is a case of doing science while black."
I don't think that this is race related, I think that the punishment is so harsh because everyone is scared of improvised explosive devices after Boston. When I first heard the story it was reported as "An Acid Bomb was Set Off At a Local High School".
Those who know, do not speak. Those who speak, do not know. ~Lao Tzu
I see no mention in the article about a bathroom; it was outside near a gazebo and she stated that she was doing a science fair experiment.
-SaNo
This girl essentially made an IED.
If you think mixing toilet cleaner and aluminum foil is essentially making an IED, then you'd be perfect for a modern school's zero-tolerance enforcement officer. Personally I'd go for the potassium permanganate and glycerine experiment, or dropping metallic sodium into water. I suppose they qualify as WMD's.
It's only an apparent lack of consistency if you use the two items to create the context in which to judge the responses. Here's the more likely scenario:
* There was no punishment forthcoming in the accidental shooting case because, after determining that there was no intent involved, and that it was, in fact, accidental, no punishment was deserved. Since there was no possibility of the parents suing themselves for damages, or that affecting the greater population, it got left at that.
* The incident on school property was punished because A) There was clearly an intent to make the explosion and B) it was on school property. That means lots of children who could potentially have been harmed, and that means lots of parents who could potentially sue the school system. Even if no one got injured, the potential for injury might be enough to have a jury in a civil suit feel that the plaintiff is "entitled" to "damages."
In that second case, everyone suffers. If the school has to pay out money to one set of irate parents, other suits will likely follow as everyone thinks they need to "get theirs," too. But guess who is on the hook? The school district, funded by property taxes or whatever they use in Florida. Thus, the community is the ones putting up the money to pay out to some jack-ass members of the community who want to take advantage of the situation. Being able to say "Look, no one got hurt but we have dealt with the perpetrator to the fullest extent of the law" goes a long way in staving off civil complaints, or having them be validated by a jury if someone thinks of doing it anyway.
It's all a CYA move. Does it suck? Yes. is it fair? No. Is life fair? Hell no. But unfortunately, we live in a chicken-shit, overly litigious society where these things happen. My mother is a public school teacher and the district where she teaches has had to deal with things like this in the past. "Science" wasn't involved, but the schools have been sued in the past, and in one incident $5,000,000 was awarded for "negligence" by the administration because two guys were fighting over a girl and one went through a plate glass window. Public schools are strapped enough for cash as it is, and losing $5,000,000 when you're already in budget shortfalls due to declining real estate values (and thus property tax revenue) is tough.
I would wager anything that was what they were concerned with above anything else.
I'm a non-anonymous Southerner, and I can agree that while it's probably not quite as bad as people elsewhere believe it is, we've still not quite escaped our past. Things are getting better generally (look back at the 1960s and 1970s and you will see that is factual), but yes, things like this at the very least give the appearance of a socially backwards society. A friend of mine from NYC once told me, "I thought I had seen racism. Then I came to college here."
If you abhor racism, the very fact that it is stronger here than in many places is a reason to STAY - I can be an active voice against it.
For conscience is the wound, and there's naught to staunch it