A Zero Tolerance Success Story

This story is currently making the internet rounds.

High school freshman Rachel Boim was expelled for writing a fictional account of a student who falls asleep in class and dreams of killing a teacher. School officials decided later that she can return to school Monday while officials reconsider the disciplinary action.

The school administrators live in a what-if world. So I can understand them being concerned and calling us in and having a discussion. But what -- everything that transpired beyond that is almost surreal. The fact that her teacher took the book because it might have been a distraction in class, that's great. The fact that the journal was not returned and he actually read the journal -- that's very, very disturbing to me. And she was expelled for inappropriate writings.

What is appropriate writing? What is not appropriate writing? What is an appropriate thought? What is not an appropriate thought? Where does that erosion of civil liberties and our rights as American citizens -- where does that begin and where does that end? That -- those are very troubling issues. And I made it very clear to them from the very beginning that those were my concerns.

Right now that story is the current hot-topic for debate over at Right-Thinking. Basically Lee, the owner of Right-Thinking, believes the school did the right thing in expelling this girl for writing a fictional account, for in a post-Columbine world we cannot afford to take chances. Aaron disagrees with Lee's point of view and so do I, for a number of reasons. Foremost among these, this was a work of ficition. No teacher is named by name. No teacher is identified by personal habits, quirks of personality, or clothing that the teacher might wear. Futhermore, the student, while female, is not even identified by name as being Rachel Boim. Rachel is, by all accounts, an extremely well adjusted child, with no history of anti-social behavior, like there was with Harris and Klebold. Rachel is also, by her own parent's accounts, a very creative child, and a gifted writer. Rachel also went to school in Denver, close to Columbine H.S., where Harris and Klebold went on their rampage. Writers rountinely use things from their personal lives and weave those things into their writings. Stephen King does it with his works, for example. It is not all that far of a stretch (if it is any stretch at all) to assume that that is what Rachel did here with her journal entry.

As I said eariler, Rachel is, by all accounts, a well-adjusted child, as this article points out.

The journal entry describes a student, who is unnamed, having a dream while asleep in class. In the dream, the student shoots a teacher and then runs out of the classroom, only to be killed by a security guard. After that, the school bell rings and the student having the dream wakes up, picks up her books and walks to another classroom.

The journal does not name a specific teacher, according to Rachel's parents, who described their daughter as a gifted writer and not someone with violent intentions.

The family and Bottoms say the suspension is another example of Georgia school officials failing to use common sense when applying "zero-tolerance" policies. Three years ago, Cobb County school officials suspended a sixth-grader from Garrett Middle School for breaking the school's zero-tolerance weapons policy by having a Tweety Bird wallet with a 10-inch keychain. Cobb officials said chains were prohibited under the weapons policy, and the girl was given the maximum punishment: a two-week suspension.

[..]

Rachel is an honors student in biology, French and English literature, her parents said. She is the captain of her crew team and a voracious reader, they added. She comes from a family of writers. Her sister edits the Roswell High School literary magazine, and her mother, Kimberly, is a former journalist and has taught literature at Chattahoochee Technical School.

So, the kid is apparently popular, comes from a family with a journalistic bent, and is an honors student. Eveything we know, in retrospect, Harris and Klebold were not. The article then goes on to say.

He said the family moved to Roswell from Colorado three years ago. Because they lived in suburban Denver at the time, the Boims often talked at home about the 1999 Columbine High School massacre, in which two students used pipe bombs and gunfire to kill 12 classmates and a teacher before killing themselves.

Like I said, writers use things from their everyday lives to write their works of fiction. This girl went to school in Denver, and her parents talked about the Columbine Massacre. It is reasonable to assume that the girl probably has no first hand knowledge about Columbine and is just going by what her mom and dad were talking about, relating to the tragedy and her own memories, second hand has as they maybe. There is nothing in that article that even indicates this child possess even a whit of the anger and hatred that drove Harris and Klebold to commit mass murder.

An honors student, captain of the crew team (I believe that is rowing), and she is a voracious reader. This is a menace to society? This is a child that needs to be expelled from school? And leave us not forget, that an expulsion goes onto a child's permanent record and that follows the child everywhere. Want to get into a good college? Well Harvard is probably out for this girl, if the expulsion is allowed to stand. Say she wants to follow in her mom's footsteps and become a reporter, Columbia School of Journalism is probably out for her as well, if the expulsion is allowed to stand. In other words, the school, by expelling this girl, have done more harm than good.

If Rachel was not popular, if this girl was known to be a victim of bullies, and if this girl was not well-adjusted - in other words; everything we know Harris and Klebold were, then the school might have a point. But since she is neither of those things, the school over-reached.

Another zero-tolerance success story, indeed.