Teen Given Detention For Hugging

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/popup/?rn=49750&cl=3121880&ch=49799&src=news

Absolutely ridiculous. Is this Iran or America? If I were a teacher in this school I couldn't even high five my students for doing a good job. Where the hell do they get the people who run these boards?

Honestly, any teacher, monitor, or anyone else who can't tell the difference between a kid putting his arm casually around his girlfriend and snapping an unwilling girl's bra strap, or between a polite handshake and a gang (or Masonic) handshake is seriously incompetent and should be removed from any and all positions of authority.

Zero tolerance is by and for morons and your kids will hate you for supporting any of it.

he placed his arm around his girlfriend in the lunch room for a few seconds. The schools have a no touch policy. I suppose raising a generation of coldhearted emotionless corporate drones is their ultimate aim.

"before you know it they are blocking the hallway"

Unbelievable. These idiots should really just be run out of the educating business.

All these stupid rules and laws that are enacted to supercede common sense and basic good judgment are about lawsuits. You can't really blame the schools too much for their dumb rules when jackass parents, egged on by the promise of untold riches from greedy ambulance chasers, are suing schools every time their kid falls down or gets in a fight. Until we as a nation get over our addiction to suing, these nonsensical laws won't go away.

That being said, the school representative in that video DID come off as a borderline lunatic. :eyes:

Rules about student conduct are made and implemented by school administrators, not lawyers.

They call the lawyers after the fact to get them out of trouble.

Of course if you would feel better dealing with large corporations, negligent medical providers, and entities that practice discrimination on the basis of age sex race etc. WITHOUT A LAWYER --try that out and let us all know that works for you.

You can't believe that school administrators don't TALK to lawyers about setting up school rules, can you? Or that said rules are put in place SPECIFICALLY so the school can say "it's against our policy..." in case of a lawsuit?

There are, sadly, many times when a lawyer is necessary, thanks in large part to the society in which we live. And lawyers make damn sure those times continue to happen.

Lawyers are available to the top officials of every school system for consultation on proper school policies. However, lawyers do not usually get involved in the day to day behavioral policies that school Administrators fashion --until a parent or student(not a lawyer) decides to challenge that policy and/or sue. In many cases the suit is filed pro se(without a lawyer) because the challenge lacks merit and no lawyer will take the case.

IF you want to point the finger at those who have the most control over 'school polices' alleged to avoid lawsuits look no further than the insurance companies that cover the schools. They dictate what the school system can and cannot do if they want to maintain insurance coverage.

There are plenty of times when access to a lawyer is essential and you would be glad to have the opportunity to consult one. However, it is totally unfair to paint all lawyers as just greedy parasites who have no interest to promote except their own.

one in Pocatello who is actually a decent guy!

Thanks for setting me straight! I wasn't aware that schools don't set and implement stupid "no touch" policies to be protected from liability, but because the insurance companies insisted upon it! And I guess the schools need all that insurance because...?

Public schools obtain liability insurance to cover themselves from claims and/or lawsuits. In order to obtain that insurance the school system has to agree to certain terms, and then when they are insured the policy contains hundreds of exclusions to coverage that are incredibly detailed.

The insurance company, not a lawyer, decides on what activities are 'too risky' for the insurer to cover --and those activities become the basis for the exclusions to coverage.

The school system has a choice. First, they can 'go naked' (without insurance) and approve activities. In that event, if a child is injured as a result of a negligent act on the school systems behalf, not only is the school system subject to being sued but the injured child may not have anyone with sufficient funds to cover the child's medical expense. Or Second, the school system can 'agree to accept the insurance company's determination of what is too risky behavior to be insured', pay the premium, and enforce the insurance company's protocol on official school related activities.

Insurance company's do hire their own attorneys to assist them in drafting the documents and enforcing the contracts. However, the decisions are made by 'risk specialists' who are usually not lawyers.

Now you know how it works, and you don't have to blame the lawyers for every policy that the school system implements, no matter how misguided they might be.

However, all I really learned is that all the rules, insurance, and general bullshit is in place so that schools don't get sued. And really, I already knew that.

I'm pretty damn sure that if we didn't live in such a sue-happy society, that school would have no "don't touch" policy.

As a matter of fact, don't call anyone out at all; it could damage their fragile adolescent psyches.

This is really gonna mess up the basketball, football and wrestling teams.

What the hell are we becoming?

:shrug:

I know it. I have no doubt. There's not even close to enough patience and tolerance in my entire being for me to allow things like this and the other shit we now read about all the time to go unchallenged. As these policies get more and more extreme, I just can't help but wonder how much more so they will be 10 years from now when it will affect my kids. May God grant me the wisdom and strength to find the right ways of dealing with it. But I'll be damned if I let anyone act the role of extremist to my children.