Student Arrested After Cutting Food With Knife

[shesulsa]

I'm just curious - has anyone here besides me been on the wrong side of a knife when attending school (grade, middle, high or otherwise)?

 

[Andy Moynihan]

It's a stone cold wonder to me why anyone takes a job as a teacher anymore.

 

[arnisador]

I'm just curious - has anyone here besides me been on the wrong side of a knife when attending school (grade, middle, high or otherwise)?

I have. I got away from him, then found him in the locker room another day after gym class when it was, shall we say, abundantly clear that he was unarmed...and then I communicated to him just how I felt about such a threat.

They took the bandages off his nose pretty quickly, but his hand was in a cast for about six weeks. (After my shot to his nose, he swung blindly at me and hit the lockers behind me when I ducked.) Makes a good story this way, but your point is well-taken. He and a friend found me alone (after school hours but in the school building) the first time and I could surely have been hurt.

I'm all for no knives in school because, alas, the odds of them being mis-used are just too high. But I'm not for a judgment-free zero-tolerance policy because there are too many grey cases.

It's a stone cold wonder to me why anyone takes a job as a teacher anymore.

Regrettably, I know what you mean.

 

[shesulsa]

I have. I got away from him, then found him in the locker room another day after gym class when it was, shall we say, abundantly clear that he was unarmed...and then I communicated to him just how I felt about such a threat.

They took the bandages off his nose pretty quickly, but his hand was in a cast for about six weeks. (After my shot to his nose, he swung blindly at me and hit the lockers behind me when I ducked.) Makes a good story this way, but your point is well-taken. He and a friend found me alone (after school hours but in the school building) the first time and I could surely have been hurt.

Good story. For me it was a latina gang in the bathroom. Running did the job for me, so no grand heroism here.

I'm all for no knives in school because, alas, the odds of them being mis-used are just too high. But I'm not for a judgment-free zero-tolerance policy because there are too many grey cases.

I completely concur. A gain in irrationality is not a gain at all. Why did they not just remove the knife, have an adult cut if for her and speak to her and her parents outside of school?

Ridiculous.

 

[Kacey]

Perhaps "blind eye" wasn't the best phrase; you can't truly ignore the problem behavior, and you do have to accept that there may be consequences. In the case you describe, there was no need for the kid to bring utensils, and the teacher shouldn't have left them in the kid's hands. That wasn't sound discretion, anymore than it would be sound discretion on my part to let a person who's impaired, but very close to the limit (say, .08 or .09 BAC), continue to drive. What do I do then? I put the person in a cab. Note that in my examples on kids with unauthorized utensils, I didn't say leave them in the kid's hands; I said the teacher should have taken them, and returned them later. You're not exercising sound discretion if you leave the dangerous situation unchanged.

Taking the fork and knife would have required "official notice" - sadly this teacher was caught in a Catch-22. On other occasions similar events with "weapons" have gone unresponded to, and nothing further happened; she was caught in a sequence of events no one could have predicted.

It's a stone cold wonder to me why anyone takes a job as a teacher anymore.

Why, for the pay, of course! :lol:

Actually, despite all of the concerns noted above and in other places, I teach because, 99% of the time, I enjoy it. Teaching is stressful, tiring, demanding - and very rewarding. But the bureaucracy is driving good teachers away all the time.

 

[Cryozombie]

Forks and Kitchen Knives are not weapons. They are eating utensils.

A Hammer is a tool. So is a screwdriver.

A pencil is a writing implement, and a belt holds my pants up. Yarn is a craft item.

I can kill a person with any of them. If a over-reactionary school board member tossed my kid out or had them arrested over a fork (or other object being used for its intended purpose), I would promptly file weapons charges against the administrator or principle for having a weapon on the premesis... the car they have in the parking lot.

More people are killed by cars every year than forks.

 

[Andrew Green]

More people are killed by cars every year than forks.

But forks are much worse, because they are used for eating. Therefore anyone with a fork intends to eat babies. People with cars only intend to run over cats.

 

[tellner]

Shesulsa, I've had knives pulled on me in high school. One emotionally disturbed roommate, a couple casual robbery attempts.

 

[FearlessFreep]

I wonder what the effect will be when these kids grow up?

Will they be drones, programmed to obey and accept rules, no matter how stupid those rules are?...

I tend to think that is the goal

 

[Carol]

Had a knife pulled on me, no.

Packed a knife because I was being bullied, yes.

 

[Big Don]

I've never had a knife pulled on me either.
One of my cousins used to carry a swiss army knife, back in the days when pocket knives were allowed in school, and would flip the Awl out and use it as a punch enhancer when picked on. He was seldom picked on twice...

 

[thardey]

My senior year in High School was when the "no-tolerance" kicked in for weapons. Before that, I remember once in Homeroom when our teacher asked to borrow a pocketknife, He instantly had 6 offered to him, including mine. (I went to a rural school, where knives were still considered tools.) He used it, and gave it right back.

At the time, any blades had to be under 2"

 

[tellner]

My father in law taught public high school in Philadelphia during the early 60s. He took knives and the occasional gun off of students all the time. A few of the kids really did need them for protection. Those ones he collected at the beginning of school and handed back at the end of the day.