I started out wanting to discuss the discipline policies of my school in general but recently an interesting incident came up at the school which makes me want to focus in on a particular problem; the problem is the danger of cell phones in the school and classroom. This has become an issue that is coming to the forefront in so many places and I don’t agree with what has been happening with the allowance of cell phones in school.
Initially I wanted to discuss discipline in general because our school started a brand new middle school section last year with a very relaxed discipline policy. We had taken the high school policy , modified it a bit to be more middle school friendly and put it into the handbook/planner. Our principal’s thoughts were that if we just trained the students (which she assumed were all very well mannered to begin with) well enough from the beginning, we wouldn’t have any issues. It turns out that wasn’t the case. Things progressed to such a stage that we created an interim Dean of Students position which added onto someone’s already full time teaching duties. This only helped a little. Finally, at the end of the year we had to all become the faculty police to regain some sort of order in the spring fever chaos that happens in many schools.
This year things have changed and we have a full time Dean of Students. The Dean works well for us but that doesn’t mean those occasional altercations and misbehaviors won’t happen. I generally don’t have a problem with how those situations get dealt with either because as long as there is a prescribed code of conduct or discipline procedure that is being followed and everyone has agreed to it, the policy works well. In most schools since people come from so many diverse backgrounds, it is important to have a system pre-designed with the school mission in mind because it would be impossible to honor each and every family’s /faculty member’s wishes in any given discipline plan. The issue this time was two boys got into a fight and a crowd surrounded them and was chanting and cheering them on. One would think this is probably a common but unwanted thing that happens in schools across the world. They got suspended as is the protocol in many schools and ours but two more students also got suspended for taping the event on their cell phones and then posting it to youtube.com. This is where is gets extreme and enters some new territory on discipline and cell phone use.
Cell phones in the classroom only became a big issue since the age of the different terror attacks: local, national and international. One side of the argument, for having cell phones in the classroom, states that it is for the students’ safety in these situations. Parents and students alike want to be able to get a hold of each other in case of emergencies. The other side of the argument, for no cell phones in classrooms, states that the cell phones are disruptive to the school/classroom environment. Schools do a great job of disseminating information when the actual emergencies arise and many schools allow children to use the school phones to contact parents if needed. I don’t think that students should carry cell phones in school but since they do have them, I have found educational uses for them on occasion.
I think that it was good decision for the students to get suspended for taping the fight and posting the fight to youtube.com. It is one that may have been outside of the scope of what may be outlined in our school handbook but it certainly seems to fit for an unprecedented issue. By taping the fight, it would be a violation of one’s right to privacy and by sharing it, I am sure that act is breaking even more laws for which an adult could easily get into lots of legal trouble. There is so much gray area in how a 12-14 year old would get treated as opposed to an adult’s treatment. I can just imagine arguments being made for and against the teenager’s level of responsibility as a person and to their society. It does however bring up several good questions about students’ rights and responsibilities which I look forward to researching for my full length paper.
Sources
Dean of Students- Middle School
Middle School Handbook- Discipline Section
http://www.schoolsecurity.org/trends/cell_phones.html
