Kids Learning the Toyota Rule

Students at the Florida high school where 17 students and staff members were massacred are now carrying their belongings in clear plastic backpacks in hopes that it will make it difficult to smuggle weapons onto campus.

Officials at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School began issuing the donated backpacks to the school's 3,200 students Monday, The Sun-Sentinel reports.

The students are being allowed through four monitored gates before school starts and only one after the opening bell. Soon, the district plans to issue metal-detecting wands to the law enforcement officers stationed at the gates. Sports bags and musical instrument cases are being searched.

Let's review some facts, shall we: The Asswipe who shot up the school used a fucking carbine that, in all probability, wouldn't have fit into a backpack. He apparently had his rifle in a duffel bag and nobody thought to inquire why someone would carry a duffel bag into a school. He wasn't even a student (having been expelled). But he still walked into the school, with his rifle, and shot the shit out of the place.

The kids, of course, think all of this is stupid as fuck and guess what? They're right.

One of the kids complained that they are "turning the schools into prisons", and well, kid, you're right. There are over 300 million guns in this country, maybe north of 450 million, and they aren't going away. Neither are the ten or so million rifles based on Eugene Stoner's design, let alone those designed by Mikhail Kalashnikov, John Williams, Bill Ruger or Sergei Simonov. Look into the compliance level in the states that have banned such guns. It's about around the levels of compliance with any other prohibition-type law.

(How many of you kids have tried cannabis? That's illegal. Tried tobacco, vaping, or alcohol? That's also illegal for minors, you know.)

So you want perfect security, kids? You want it so no outsider can come in and do you harm? You want it so no other student can bring in any sort of weapon and do you harm? You want to feel safe in school? Then your school is going to look, feel, and operate like a prison.

You asked for it.

You got it.

Toyota.

Waylon Bates Hates Freedom

He is the principal of the Parkway high school in Bossier City, Louisiana. Mr. Bates has banned taking a knee at sporting events.

It's pretty clear that such a protest is permitted by the Constitution.

The school is a public school--- it is a governmental entity.

It is unconstitutional for Mr. Bates to have issued his little fiat.

So ask yourself: What lesson is Mr. Bates teaching the kids if he, as a government official, can ban free expression just because he doesn't like the message?

Why does he hate freedom?

Bravo to New Mexico

What is “lunch shaming?” It happens when a child can’t pay a school lunch bill.

In Alabama, a child short on funds was stamped on the arm with “I Need Lunch Money.” In some schools, children are forced to clean cafeteria tables in front of their peers to pay the debt. Other schools require cafeteria workers to take a child’s hot food and throw it in the trash if he doesn’t have the money to pay for it.

In what its supporters say is the first such legislation in the country, New Mexico has outlawed shaming children whose parents are behind on school lunch payments.

On Thursday, Gov. Susana Martinez signed the Hunger-Free Students’ Bill of Rights, which directs schools to work with parents to pay their debts or sign up for federal meal assistance and puts an end to practices meant to embarrass children. It applies to public, private and religious schools that receive federal subsidies for students’ breakfasts and lunches.

Every school administrator who did (or does) this should have been locked into a set of stocks and then pelted with rotten fruit from the school cafeteria. It's not the kids' fault that they are poor or that their parents are deadbeats. But they are the ones that the school administrators chose to bear the brunt of their parents' inability or unwillingness to pay for their lunches.

Gov. Martinez, by the way, is a Republican. No doubt that she'll be drummed out of her party for an act of compassion.

Texas: Racist, Crazy, or Both.

So a kid in Irving, Texas built an electronic clock out of parts. He took it to school to show his teachers.

But, because the kid has the name "Ahmed Mohammed", everybody freaks out, the cops get called, the kid gets hauled off in handcuffs and they may charge him for bringing a fake bomb to school.

No matter which room that kid is in this process, including the courtroom, he'll be the smartest one in it. Which may not be hard in Texas.

Dare to Scrap DARE

DARE, which is an acronym for Drug Abuse Resistance Education, is a Reagan-era "just say no to drugs" education program. Your local paper, especially in smaller towns, may run stories about kids completing DARE training and getting some certificate.

The problem is that the program doesn't work. It's a government boondoggle for the DARE presenters (mostly cops, it would seem) and for the companies that produce DARE educational materials. Just like "abstinence-only" sex education, DARE is both a darling of the Right (because it was dreamed up by Saint Ronnie) and is wholly ineffective.

DARE is a big government program promoted by people who hate big government.

Starting the "No Fun Zone" Early in Colorado

A mother in Aurora, CO sent her kid off to school with lunch. Included in the lunch were a few Oreo cookies. Which the school not only didn't let the kid eat the cookies, they sent them back with a note to the mother about healthy eating.

So now the teachers are inspecting the lunch bags? For what, exactly? Smuggled vodka?

The school's denying that was their policy. Which is probably bullshit, because when bureaucrats end up being publicly shamed, they find some flunky to throw under the bus.

The Hidden Tax on Parents in Texas

If you live in Texas and you want your children to receive an education from people operating in the rational world, you're probably going to have to send the to kids to a private school.

Because in the public schools, they can't seem to tell the difference between reality and fantasy:

A Kermit parent said his fourth-grade student was suspended [Jan. 30th] for allegedly making a terroristic threat.

His father, Jason Steward, said the family had been to see “The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies” last weekend. His son brought a ring to his class at Kermit Elementary School and told another boy his magic ring could make the boy disappear.

Steward said the principal said threats to another child’s safety would not be tolerated – whether magical or not. Principal Roxanne Greer declined to comment on the matter.

Riiight. Only in Texas will a threat to use magic on someone be considered a real threat, at least since the Dark and Middle Ages ended.

And this is how Texas defines terrorism-- threatening to use magic?

Shorter San Diego Schools: "OK, So Maybe We Don't Really Need a Tank."

The San Diego school district will return its armored military vehicle to the Department of Defense, school officials announced Thursday night.

I gather that they found a serious downside to having a heavily armed vehicle to deliver medical supplies and teddy bears.

Meanwhile, the LA School District is going to keep their MRAP and M-16s, but they are going to give back their grenade launchers. As much as it probably kills them to do so. LA is a huge place, as far as geography goes. The freeways are often jammed. It's 50% larger in area than New York City, maybe 40% or so the size of Rhode island, and they're going to be able to ensure that they have their one armored vehicle where they happen to need it?

For a civilian police department, let along a school district's police department, having a MRAP is the police equivalent of an edifice complex.

Hey, LAUSD! Nice MRAP. 

Sorry about your small penises, though.

Doesn't Your School District Have a SWAT Team?

At least one does in Texas. Because responding to a burglary alarm at 3 AM takes a full SWAT rollout in Texas.

Time was that a burglary alarm going off at 3AM would get two cops armed with Smith Model 10s or Colt Official Police revolvers. But that was back in the days of real coppers, not paramilitary wannabees.

The LA School District cops also got them a MRAP and they have grenade launchers. In case they want to frag the little bastards from a distance.

Doesn't Every School System Need a Tank?

Hey, kiddies! Your teachers have a tank! So behave!

The San Diego Unified School District Police Department has acquired its own vehicle, known as a MRAP, and expect it to be operational by October.

San Diego thinks they can use it in an emergency. They seem to think they can use it in an earthquake, because it can pull down a wall, but what good is that? They'd have a structurally-compromised building and then Barney Fife is going to start to yank down walls? Without any knowledge of structural engineering?

Are they smoking crack?

The San Diego School Police are trying to calm everyone down. "It's not a tank!"" "We'll paint a big Red Cross on it!" "We'll have teddy bears inside!"

Bullshit. You don't need an armored infantry fighting vehicle to deliver medical supplies and teddy bears. A truck would do the job, or a fucking ambulance. And painting it white and slapping on a Red Cross doesn't make it any less militarized.

For if that was the case, this gun would be legal to buy in California:

Asshole Identified

A few days ago, I asked who was the asshole who voted to kick a girl out of school for shaving her head in support of her friend who is battling cancer.

The answer is: Bill Newcomer.

So, Who Was That Asshole; Educational Edition

By now, you've probably heard of the Colorado girl who shaved her head in solidarity with her friend who went bald from chemo. The school where the girl who shaved her head took a dim view of that and suspended her for violating the school dress code.

No surprise that blew across the Intertubes like a shit-storm. One thing that social media, blogs and what not are good for is bringing shame and opprobrium down on the head of asshole bureaucrats.

And that's what happened to the numbnuts who were running Caprock Academy in Grand Junction, CO. The asshats administrators who run the school met and voted 3-1 to modify the dress code to permit supportive head-shaving.

Which leaves this question unanswered: Which one of those assholes voted to not change the policy?

And when someone becomes a school administrator, do they take that person into the hospital and scoop out much of their frontal lobes with a melon-baller?

School Administrators-- Always Looking for More Pearls to Clutch

Even "Hump Day" brings on a bout of pearl-clutching:

Sometimes, reality cannot be out-snarked.

Right-Wing Jibber-Jabber on Education

Michelle Rhee was on the Daily Show, flogging her line[1], and I'm paraphrasing here: "We can have great schools if we only can get those lazy dead-ass teachers to do their jobs".

You can see this here at part 1, part 2 and part 3. Oh, she gives lip service to the need for other social services, but let's face the truth of the matter: A child who is ill-housed, ill-clothed and ill-fed[2] is not going to be very receptive to even the greatest teachers. Jon Stewart kept trying to get her to address the point that the charter school movement is skimming off the cream and leaving the regular public schools as a dumping ground for the kids that are hard to teach, but she just danced and danced around the question.

It was insane. Rhee says she wants to free teachers to do their jobs, but she thinks that there has to be "metrics", which is code for "teach to the test." Which, as Stewart kept trying to point out, means that the kids are being taught to pass a test. For someone who says that she respects teachers, Rhee seems to spend a shitload of time bashing them.

Rhee is suffering from an advanced case of Hammer Syndrome.[3] If she is going to help fix the educational problem, she has to do more than give lip service to the problems that affect children's inabilities to do well in school. As Stewart tried to point out to her, you can have great seeds, but if you cast them onto barren soil, good luck trying to get the plants to grow.
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[1] And her book.
[2] A child whose only decent meals are provided by the school system is going to be hard to educate.
[3] "When the only tool you have is a hammer, all of your problems tend to look like nails."

Ho, Ho, Ho, You're Under Arrest

A kid in Georgia was suspended because his plan to come to school dressed up as Santa and hand out candy canes was deemed to be a threat by the school's administrators.

Because nothing says "mass murder" like Santa Claus.

I'd say "get a grip", but if there is any profession better known for an unhinged grasp of reality than school administrators, I don't know what it is.*
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* "Fox News on-air personality" is hardly a "profession".

Zero Tolerance and No Brains at All

Hunter Spanjer says his name with a certain special hand gesture, but at just three and a half years old, he may have to change it.

"He's deaf, and his name sign, they say, is a violation of their weapons policy," explained Hunter's father, Brian Spanjer.

The school district wants to come to the "best solution" to the problem.

Here's an idea: Stop acting like morons.

School Administrator "Doesn't Want to Overreact"??-- zOMG, STOP THE PRESSES!!!1!

It's true. Some kids put some goats onto the roof of a school and the principal doesn't want to "overreact to the incident".

Somebody want to tell this guy that he is violating the Most Holy Code of School Administrators? Overreacting is what they do!

The Criminalization of School Children; Texas Edition

It should be little surprise that, when it comes to treating misbehaving school kids as members of the FFA,* Texas leads the way. So if Johnny shoots a spitball at Timmy, little Johnny might be hauled off in handcuffs.

Get this: Yelling on the playground can get the kid a ticket. And if the parents don't pay it, as soon as the kid turns 18, the po-po will arrest the kid and lock his or her ass up.

How does this make any sense to anyone, at least anyone with a working cortex?**
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* Future Felons of America.
** Which, of course, excludes school administrators.

The Criminalization of School Children; Missouri Edition

Let's say that you want to be a school administrator. So here is the test: It comes to your attention that a student with Down's Syndrome has hugged a teacher's aide.

If your reaction is to have the kid arrested and charged with sexual harassment, then: Congratulations! You're qualified to be a school administrator.

The Brownbacking Apology

Gov. Brownback apologized for his staff brownbacking about a snarky tweet by a teenager.

The Shawnee Mission School District overruled the demand of the high school principal, Karl R. Krawitz, that Emma Sullivan apologize to Brownback for hurting his feelings. Apparently, Krawitz has not apologized for his total ignorance of the First Amendment.

Because he is a school administrator and as we all should know by now, holding such a job pretty much requires that one undergo a cortex-ectomy in order to do the job right.

Still unanswered is why Governor Browback has a staffer whose job it to scour social media for snarky comments about the governor. Is that person's job being funded with taxpayer money? Are the good people of Kansas paying for some hypersensitive asshat to run a Twitter patrol?