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VM177, I very much appreciate all of the quotes that you have provided. They give far more depth to the problem that I had imagined.

But the truth is that all of education isn't like this. For example, here is a program that is sponsored by many schools that does encourage creativity and creative thinking
http://www.odysseyofthemind.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.
My wife and coached a team and find it to be a very rewarding experience. As an music teacher, I got never "got the memo" that kids weren't supposed to be creative and think creatively - which may well explain why I was laid off two years in a row for "budget cuts".

Being a fellow conspiracy theorist, I do think there is an element of "making an example" of some kids. I don't think that it is targeted at anyone in particular but takes the approach of seizing a moment and turning it into an "opportunity" I do understand Hanlon's razor but the incidents are too frequent and too widespread to be only random. Every one of them deals with an almost insignificant matter that no one would have noticed that is blown out of all proportion through "zero tolerance" and splashed all over the media. OK, I'll take my tin foil hat off now.

So where is the ACLU on this? I agree that this kid's rights were violated. It is an interesting paradox that a 16 year old boy is juvenile hall because he killed a police officer
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/02/22/st ... -shooting/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

and this kid is arrested and put into jail because he drew a stick figure diagram. What is wrong with this picture?

VMI77 wrote:

chasfm11 wrote:Some of our most intelligent and most talented kids cannot deal with with the super regimes in some of our public schools.

Personally, I think that is a deliberate purpose of these policies: to marginalize the threat of bright and creative students who won't conform and to scare any other bright students into conformity. The educational system likes to ruin the lives of non-conformists early, before there is any danger of them reaching positions of power and influence. The primary purpose of the public school system is to ensure conformity.

Part of it is the political correctness of not recognizing success. Rewards and acknowledgments cannot be given because those that don't receive them will suffer from low self-esteem. There is an element of efficiency because it is easier to get all 30 kids in the classroom doing the same things at the same times in the lower grades. There is also the aspect that it takes extra work to figure out how to reach "different" students. While some teachers worry about this and will invest extra thought into accomplishing it, others lack the training to recognize special learning needs and the energy to pursue them. Their response to special situations is often like those who don't speak another's foreign language and think that the solution is simply to say the same thing again but louder.

The growth of ADD and ADHD in recent years is not the result of better detection, in my opinion, but of forced institutionalization. The sad use of drugs to "combat" these conditions, even marginal ones is simply a way of avoiding the underlying problems with the system.

But as you have pointed out, Purplehood, this matter goes way beyond that. I still have trouble getting to how a drawing is an arrestable offense. Without some sort of specific verbal threat, the matter doesn't seem to be LE related. A suspension from school is one thing. A ride in the squad car is another.

My main message out of this situation is that if the "system" can be this heartless to child, who already had a diagnosed problem, was under treatment for it and was carefully following the instructions from that treatment, just think of the possible intolerance (injustice?) that could occur with an adult.

I agree that a situation like this would seem more likely in CO (and CA, WA, etc.) than in Texas.

On a side note, I firmly believe that way too many children are treated for "problems" when the underlying issue that they are being forced in a level of conformity within the school environment that they cannot handle. Some of our most intelligent and most talented kids cannot deal with with the super regimes in some of our public schools. Not every child learns the same way, at the same pace or with the same methods. In another less rigid environment, the boy in this story may not have had ADD or ADHD in the first place. You cannot run schools like prisons and expect all kids to do well. These parents would do well to see alternative education. It will be cheaper in the long run than the legal bills.

There have been countless discussions about what we should do if we are involved in a shooting. Here is another example (in my opinion) of:
- overzealous police work
- cooperation that lead to an arrest after the fact

Fox News KDVR.Com
Julie Hayden Reporter
7:50 a.m. MST, February 22, 2011
http://www.kdvr.com/news/kdvr-arvada-po ... 9823.story