When Schools Are the Police 725
First time accepted submitter Is Any Nickname Left writes "The Washington Post has an article on school systems with their own police forces. It focuses on Texas, which has the highest number of 'School Police Departments,' of which there are so many they have their own trade association. Highlights: 1) Houston fourth-grader stood on a stool so he could see the judge. He pleaded guilty. To a scuffle on a school bus. 2) 275,000 juvenile tickets in fiscal 2009, to students as young as 5. 3) Austin middle school student ticketed after she sprayed herself with perfume when classmates said she smelled. 4) a 17-year-old was in court after he and his girlfriend poured milk on each other. 'She was mad at me because I broke up with her,' he said. I waiting for the Alamo Heights Special Airborne Brigade and SEAL TEAM CROCKETT."
Re:Result of Truancy Laws (Score:5, Informative)
I'm sorry I wasn't more descriptive.
This particular school was rural, and had a small student population. (My graduating class would have been 90 students)
Due to the small student body size, the school had to rely on extracurricular activites generating income for the school.
As a result, the school administration came up with some 'clever' solutions to keeping dumb as rocks kids that lived and breathed football academically eligable to play.
One such clever solution was the implementation of large group projects, where grades were given to the whole group.
Think:
Science fair project. Many students are supposed to work together to create an awesome team effort project. In theory.
In reality, the cliche smart kid does all the work, makes the project, sets up and tears down the exhibit, and writes the experiment reports. The other kids assigned coast on his/her hard work, and do nothing.
To add insuult to injury, and a point which further illustrates the true intent of the practice, is the percentage of the yearly grade that such group projects add up to. (In this case, cumulatively they added up to over 70% of the grade, meaning that as long as that smart kid keeps doing all the work, the freeloaders still get passing grades, even if they bomb all their homework and tests.)
That is how failing on purpose derailed the gravy train.