Free birth control and all the sex you can handle...

[Fuzzykitten99]

Just don't hug anyone!!!! Good lord, where is this school's priorities? How about common sense? Guess that ain't so common anymore. I can see banning making out, and having it there for those couples that hang all over each other, but friendly hugs??? PUH-LEASE!!! Big Brother rears his ugly head...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21661718/

<snip> MASCOUTAH, Ill. - Two hugs equals two days of detention for 13-year-old Megan Coulter.

The eighth-grader was punished for violating a school policy banning public displays of affection when she hugged two friends Friday.

“I feel it is crazy,” said Megan, who was to serve her second detention Tuesday after classes at Mascoutah Middle School.

“I was just giving them a hug goodbye for the weekend,” she said.

Megan’s mother, Melissa Coulter, said the embraces weren’t even real hugs — just an arm around the shoulder and slight squeeze.

“It’s hilarious to the point of ridicule,” Coulter said. “I’m still dumbfounded that she’s having to do this.”

.... <snip>

[Dreamstalker]

I was shuffled off to some camp once (Wediko, apparently it's now a boys-only camp) that did basically the same thing. Their thing was, you had to ask before you could hug someone. Absolutely insane.

I was going to say it's a resurrection of the urban myth that one can get pregnant from hugging, but there's an obvious problem in this instance.

Zero tolerance taken way too far (it was taken way too far before this, but I digress)? It baffles me how friendly hugging can be seen as on par with a PDA.

[NightAngel]

The only way I could see it being valid would be if the other kid complained or if it was a gropefest or something. Which obviously wasn't the case here.

I'm not a 'huggy' person (my kids/hubby excluded- hug them all the time) but I figure if I open my arms in that 'hug invite' way then the person can either move for the hug- or not.

[Greenday]

Some people might not get hugged, and the sight of seeing other people hug would hurt them so deeply they'd blame the school for letting them be sad.

Bulls***! Anyway, this could be one of the dumbest rules I've ever heard and she should be telling the administration to kiss her ass.

[rahmota]

Wow. Some people just cant figure thigns out can they. PDA is one thign and a simple nonsexual friendly hug is another. Heck back in high school half the girls would have been suspended as they would hug each other if they got a good grade, got a new boyfriend, lost a boyfriend. gahhh.


Overreact much?

[AFPheonix]

Zero-tolerance strikes again. Bureaucrats who don't want to have to think like to have rules like this that they can hide behind. All it does is piss people off. You'd think by now that people would be voting in school boards who would do away with zero-tolerance policies of any kind, but apparently not. Perhaps they like news stories like this where they can feel smugly superior to some dim-witted school official?

[Luna]

I'm not even sure what to say other than I'm glad I've been out of school for a long time. Reading that link hurt my head and makes me sad.

[DesignFox]

That's just stupid! We didn't get punished for giving hugs at school... jeez.

It's different if two kids are making out or groping each other...or if the "hug" is forced on a person who doesn't want one.

But two friends give each other a quick hug goodbye and now the giver of the hug has DETENTION? Sheesh! Shouldn't we be applauding kids for hugging each other and being friendly? I mean, they could be out beating the crap out of each other...

I guess half my school would have been in detention...

[MadMike]

I've said this before, and I'll say it again: The scariest part is the fact that these are the people who are educating our kids.

[ShockQueen]

I've said this before as well.........and now we know why homeschooling is on a meteoric rise - all the stupid, ridiculous nonsense rules that they are making in an effort to fend off the lawyers instead of teaching our nation's young! No wonder we're in such a mess! We're so busy trying to be PC that we've given up on common sense!

[rahmota]

Its not just about being PC thats got the problems in the schools. Schools are having to watch what they say and do because they are under attack from various directions.

They have the religious uptights wanting proper morals taught in school as well as nothing offensive to their religion such as evolution being taught or Mark Twain or Anne Frank being read in class.

They have the historical revisionists who dont want anything that disagrees with the viewpoint they have, whichever revisionist they are. Fortunately this is not as major a problem as the first one but still it is there.

Then they have the PC inclusionist hippies who want everyone to feel included and no child left behind and everyone getting the same exact treatment.

Then there is No Child Left Behind (capital letters) which limits how teachers can do their jobs and wwhat they can actually teach.

Then theres the usual stuff like athletics fighting for funding against arts and against academics. Some districts are better at it than other but still.


I'll agree that homeschooling can be a wonderful thing. The only problem with that is that a lot of parents dont have the investment in time or education themselves to teach basic curriculum and it winds up being no better than a religious dogma indoctrination or lacking in other ways. Not everyone of course but a large enough percentage that it makes me wonder. The solution to the education systems problems is very complex and a lot of learned people dont have a clue.

[Seshat]

What surprises me, considering all that, is how well we over here in Aussieland are doing. Each of our six states runs their own education system (I'm not sure who runs the territories' systems - I suspect that Northern Territory runs their own, the Australian Capital Territory may use the New South Wales' system).

But they're run at a state level, not at a more local level. The curriculum is determined on a state-by-state basis, with the federal government having an interest in ensuring the curricula generally match. School funding is on a state-by-state basis as well.

Yes, there are special interests who try to lobby the education system, but because they have to compete with each other across the whole state rather than locally, they tend to balance out.

We do have dramas, of course, but no state here has tried to establish pi as being 3 or 3.25 or whatever it was.