Just when you think you’ve heard it all, a story like this comes along. Obviously we’re all for punishing kids for bringing real weapons to school. But what about earlier this year, when a Maryland 7-year-old was suspended for nibbling his Pop-Tart into the shape of a handgun. when a Hello Kitty bubble gun resulted in a suspension of an Elementary School child? We’ve heard similar stories of students being suspended for pointing “machine gun” pencils at one another at recess, making the distinct pretend sounds of the military weapons, but now a principal in Pennsylvania has decided to suspend 10-year-old Johnny Jones for “shooting” an imaginary bow-and-arrow at a fellow classmate.
The Rutherford Institute, a national civil rights group, is helping the family to fight the bizarre suspension. Here’s how they describe what happened:
The incident took place the week of October 14th, when fifth grader Johnny Jones asked his teacher for a pencil during class. Jones walked to the front of the classroom to retrieve the pencil, and during his walk back to his seat, a classmate and friend of Johnny’s held his folder like an imaginary gun and “shot” at Johnny. Johnny playfully used his hands to draw the bowstrings on a completely imaginary “bow” and “shot” an arrow back. Seeing this, another girl in the class reported to the teacher that the boys were shooting at each other. The teacher took both Johnny and the other boy into the hall and lectured them about disruption. The teacher then contacted Johnny’s mother, Beverly Jones, alerting her to the “seriousness” of the violation because the children were using “firearms” in their horseplay, and informing her that the matter had been referred to the Principal. Principal John Horton contacted Ms. Jones soon thereafter in order to inform her that Johnny’s behavior was a serious offense that could result in expulsion under the school’s weapons policy. Horton characterized Johnny’s transgression as “making a threat” to another student using a “replica or representation of a firearm” through the use of an imaginary bow and arrow.
John Whitehead, the head attorney and founder of the Virginia-based Rutherford Institute, explained, “He’s got a weapons charge — it’s crazy.” The organization sent a letter to South Eastern School District Superintendent Rona Kaufmann on December 4. The denounces the school’s action “ludicrous,” demanding that Kaufmann remove the charge from Johnny’s permanent record and rescind his one-day suspension. The letter gives the school until the 13th to respond.
Whitehead says his organization has been defending students in school incidents involving pretend and fake weapons since the 1990s. But they began to see the paranoia really ramp up after the infamous Columbine shooting in 1999. According to Whitehead, school have “ramped up” their punishment for such “crimes of the imagination.” Things got even more extreme, he notes, after Sandy Hook. The latest trend, he adds, is to call the police when children point their fingers like guns on the playground.
“All a teacher has to say is, ‘That’s not appropriate behavior,’” Whitehead explained. Instead, they are relying on “harmful” zero-tolerance policies, he said further. “We’re teaching these kids to put their heads down and to be afraid of authority all the time.”
Whitehead concludes bluntly, that “when we’re focusing on the Johnny Joneses, the kid with the real gun is walking through the door.”
(Article by James Achisa; image modified from Shutterstock stock image)
School Suspends 10-Year-Old For Pretend Shooting Bow and Arrow With Fingers
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