From WSB radio:
Resource officers at Sprayberry High School found a six inch folding knife during a random search of 17-year-old Michael Needham’s Jeep.
Despite telling the police the knife was accidentally left in the SUV after a camping trip, the teenager was jailed for 14 hours before being freed on bond.
In addition to the felony charge of possessing a weapon on school property, Needham was suspended for ten days. The senior was also kicked off the football team.
From WSB TV:
Will Chandler said he knows he should not have left campus when he and two friends left Wheeler High School for lunch a week ago.
“I was like, ‘Alright, I’m going to get in trouble.’ I didn’t even know the knife was in there. I completely forgot about it and then they pulled it out,” said Chandler.
A school officer found a Swiss Army knife in Chandler’s car’s console. Under the school’s zero tolerance policy it was an automatic suspension for Chandler.
The next day, the Chandlers found out Will had also been charged with a felony.
“When the principal said to me, ‘This could kill someone,’ I said to him, ‘So could a pencil.’ My son did not have this on his physical body, did not have it on him, it was not in his backpack, it was not in his locker. It was in the console of the car,” said Sharon.
A Cobb School District spokesperson said their policy states a knife with a blade that’s more than 2 inches — the Swiss Army knife is 3 inches — results in an automatic suspension and an automatic criminal charge.
Zero Tolerance. Amazing, just amazing. Cobb County schools have a record of this nonsense. Several years ago they kicked little Ashley Smith out of school because she came to school with a little Tweetie Bird on a key chain. I guess it can be said that people who send their children to these Cobb County government schools pretty much get what they deserve.
The facts about Zero Tolerance?
- They make us lazy. They offer broad, blanket solutions to complicated problems and thus spare us having to make tough calls based on evidence and reasoned judgment.
- They don’t differentiate. In their application, there’s no discerning between unruly, incorrigible delinquents and essentially good kids who made a mistake.
- They take away decision making. The people with experience, judgment and on-the-ground observation are replaced by rule books.
- They give a false sense of security. Prevention, through consistent, fair and firm discipline and early identification and intervention with at-risk students, is a far more rational and effective long-term prescription for healthier kids and safer schools.
Sprayberry High School, Michael Needham, Will Chandler, Wheeler High School, Zero Tolerance, Cobb County
