9/11 T-shirts no exception — I can understand some of this dress code nonsense, but what I do NOT get are the lengthy suspension punishments. How about just telling the kid to change the shirt and ending the problem. Cripes. ANd it’s not as if the messages on the t-shirt are bad, are they?
Ben Lewandowski says he was only trying to be patriotic when he wore a homemade T-shirt featuring an American flag bumper sticker and the words “Remember 9/11” to Lincoln Park High School on Monday.
After all, it was Sept. 11 — five years after the terrorist attacks.
The 17-year-old Lincoln Park resident put the shirt on Monday morning and headed to school — where he was quickly sent to the office and suspended for three days for violating the school’s dress code.
He was one of at least seven students sent home for wearing shirts featuring patriotic images and messages. It comes less than a week after three siblings were suspended for wearing shirts emblazoned with the First Amendment, despite warnings, and a week after more than 200 students were sent home on the first day of school for violating the district’s dress code — which bans apparel with writing or pictures.
For Lewandowski, who was sent home on the first day of school for wearing a shirt with writing on it, Monday’s incident was his second offense.
“I was frustrated,” said the junior, whose desire to become a firefighter was fueled after the Sept. 11 attacks. “It just made me so mad that I can’t be patriotic.”
Hardass Randall Kite Has a Track Record for this
He’s also into ID badges since the schools are apparently so impersonal
And this anti-witch stuff is rich too!
Let me say, AGAIN, that I disagree with the policies. I’m with the court on Tinker, and I don’t care for the idea of regulating speech on shirts and clothing. I also think, as I said, the logo thing is crap.
My point is when you set a rule, you must enforce it and you cannot be, in a school setting, wavy and flexible on who you apply the rule to. Reason is acceptable (giving a child a zero on a test for absence when the reason is appropriate but not reflected in the code of conduct would be cruel and ridiculous) but there are times where you have to stick by your guns.
A student who has been warned has been warned. You might not have made a case out of the second shirt EXCEPT you had the discussion previously. Now you must. If you ignore the second one, who is watching and seeing selective enforcement of the rules?
Run a school for 10 minutes and get back to me. Students, parents, community, government, the media, all clamoring for their agendae. Without clearly defined policies, any or all of them are waiting to punce.
By the way, in loco parentis pretty much suspends the First Amendment at the door. Students don’t have freedom of speech or expression. They are minors under the care of adults, who may search their lockers without prior notice, regulate the publication of newspapers and flyers, and determine what gets hung on the wall.
It’s a school. These policies help to keep order and maintain a focus on what is important- learning.
oops- pounce!