Willing To Do What Ever It Took To Expel This 8th Grader!!

Howard's Story is particularly "post worthy" for the web site because it clearly illustrates an all too common aspect of "public school injustice" the fact that "the cops" or in this case the school officials appear willing to intentionally exaggerate and misrepresent the facts in order to insure they get their man (or in this case an 8th grade child).

Parents go into these things encouraging there children to be forthright, honest and to take responsibility for their actions. They go into it naively thinking the school officials are "friends." They want to trust the system and support the system.

BIG MISTAKE! You might as well put a blindfold on your child and encourage him to play pin the tail on the donkey on an LA Freeway at rush hour. Believe me if your school has Zero Tolerance policies the SCHOOL OFFICIALS ARE NOT YOUR FRIENDS AND CAN NOT BE TRUSTED when your child gets in trouble.

Read Howard's Story and see what you think.

Howard's Story, From Fairfax County, VA:

During the last week of May, 2000, our son purchased an 8th ounce of marijuana. On June 2, he brought a joint to school and gave it to a friend, who gave it to another boy whom my son did not know. This boy was turned in by an anonymous note. As it turned out, he also had some marijuana hidden in the heel of his shoe. He was busted and the trail led quickly back to my son, who denied any involvement until my wife arrived at the school and instructed him to tell the truth. He did and was immediately suspended ten days and recommended for expulsion by the principal, following FCPS regulations. Though out of school, he had to complete all his remaining courses (including a term paper) and fail them for the quarter of the violation.

My wife also let the police search our premises without a warrant. They found the remainder of my son's marijuana--2.09 grams--along with a homemade bong, three cigarette papers, and six seeds. They searched our attic looking for a marijuana growing operation but found no trace of any such. They also searched our yard.

Before the first hearing, on June 15, I urged my son to tell the truth about all marijuana use. I believe that he did, stating that he had purchased a $5 amount the preceding Sept., a $25 amount in April, and $50 worth (the 8th ounce) in May. He explained that he had built his bong out of tubing from his ant farm, and had never grown any marijuana in the attic. Thinking I was sharing information with people concerned about my son's well being and interested in understanding his motivation, I mentioned that he often felt alienated from school and had friends who felt the same way. One of the two hearing officers assured me that, given his confession, my son would certainly be expelled and never be allowed to enter his base high school, Fairfax High. That was what was normally done in such cases.

Still, I expected the hearing report, forwarded to the School Board along with a recommendation for expulsion, would reflect what had been determined in the first hearing. It would say that my son had purchased an 8th oz., the police found 2.09 grams, etc.

Instead, it proved to be a kind of "profile," scattering information out of context. The fact my son had missed ten days of school was presented with no reference to the medical reasons for this (e.g., blood poisoning from an infected knee, which prevented him from walking), and of course my "disappointment" in his choice of some friends. But my jaw dropped to the floor when I saw the report also stated that--

1. police had discovered "a large stash of marijuana and paraphernalia" in my son's room, "including pipes, bongs, and fertilizer that could be used in growing marijuana."

2. and twice stated that an "anonymous witness" had told the hearing officers that my son had said he had a "marijuana growing operation in the attic," with no mention of the unannounced police search and its results. (There was no mention of this witness during the hearing.)

3. and without ever specifying the amount of marijuana involved in the case, either at school or in the police report, the letter closed by saying "IT WOULD BE UNUSUAL

FOR SOMEONE TO PURCHASE SUCH A LARGE AMOUNT FOR PERSONAL USE."

And this would be the School Board's first "information" on my son's case.

I am curious as to whether others view this as I do, not as carelessness, but as misrepresentation with malicious intent. Two hearing officers sitting in judgment over a child's future selected evidence, exaggerated and lied to insure that the Board would see him, not as a 14-year-old experimenting with marijuana among like-minded acquaintances, but as a grower and dealer, a "danger" to others.

Here it is months later and nothing about this whole affair has angered me so much as these school officials lying in order to increase the load of pain on an 8th grader. I spoke to four lawyers who explained to me that I had NO LEGAL RECOURSE for any damage done by such actions, and so far as I can tell there is no recognition that such actions occur, let alone an accounting for them.

I was informed that I had the right to appeal before a School Board committee. I suspected this was no more than a "right" to the same kind of hearing we'd just been through, but I wanted to get the results of the police report read or written into my son's record to counter-balance the malicious hearing report.

At the outset of Board hearing, which took place on July 25, I asked the Board members if they made any distinction at all between first-time and repeat offenders, large or small amounts in possession, sharing as opposed to selling. I asked if they took grades and prior disciplinary record into account. In short, I asked them if they had a "zero tolerance" policy.

They assured me that they considered every student on a "case by case basis." And the hearing got underway as an Area II official repeated sections of the hearing report concerning the "large amount" of marijuana recovered from my son's room, and the Principal of his school stated that so far as the school knew, the police had searched his room but not the attic.

I showed the Board committee a photograph, taken in the police property room, of the marijuana and paraphernalia recovered from my son's room. I went over the police report and refuted point by point the distortions of the hearing report. (However, the police would not release an actual copy of the report.)

I gave the Board letters of character reference from teachers, coaches, a judge, and a well-known criminologist (my son's uncle).

A teacher from Fairfax High who knew my son came and spoke on his behalf, also assuring them that he would be closely monitored were he allowed into FHS. And finally the Board questioned my son in an effort to determine whether he had learned his lesson.

Things seemed to be going well. The Board members spoke gently, like friendly and concerned teachers. Then with five minutes left, it was time for Area II officials to sum up their case. It was, briefly, that "given the large amount of marijuana" recovered from by son's room, it was clear he was a threat to other students, who had a right to a drug free environment. Their recommendation was for expulsion.

I was startled by the vehemence of this assertion and its restatement of the hearing report, with no recognition at all of the police report. In the final few minutes I made one last appeal, reminding the Board that children cannot legally sign contracts because their judgment is not yet mature. They do not always understand the consequences of their actions. The law takes youth into account, but school officials hold the judgment of children to a higher standard than they do that of adults, while punishing them more harshly.

I also pointed out the disjunct between expressing concern for the safety and rights of children, while at the same time ignoring the risk to them posed by absence of due process.

None of this apparently mattered. Since the other boys involved were only suspended for a year and placed in alternative schools, I must speculate that, if anything, contesting the hearing report may have worsened my son's situation. In addition to failing his last quarter, he was

1. expelled, with the addition that even if readmitted to FCPS he would never be allowed to attend Fairfax High--a school he had not yet even attended. The expulsion meant that he could not attend his sister's graduation from FHS, nor play summer basketball with his friends at the local grade school, nor attend a Christmas concert.

Further, he could attend no sports events, even outside the county or state, if Fairfax High students were participating--even if his parents accompanied him.

2. required to do 60 hrs of community service before Nov. 1, which meant that he also had to find community groups which would accept an expellee as a volunteer (e.g., Farifax City Museum, one of my son's first choices because of his interest in history, does not.)

3. required to undergo an evaluation from Alcohol and drug services, which lead to months of counseling and attendence at AA meetings.

The report of this evaluation sent back to the school noted that my son included "sips of beer" as part of his drug history, with no mention of the fact I had allowed him to taste a beer at the dinner table.

4. offered placement in a local adult high school, with transportation provided by his parents. We could not get him into another public or private school, and a lawyer counseled us to go with the adult high school rather than home schooling, because then we would have a record of attendance and good behavior.

5. He was allowed to reapply during the second quarter of his expulsion, if he fulfilled the conditions above. At the time we did not realize how unlikely any readmission would be. He did his community service, got an A and a B+ in his first trimester at the adult high school, and attended outpatient counseling with alcohol and drug services, which required weekly AA meetings (first one, then two a week). In most therapist/patient relationships, the therapist is supposed to give priority to patients well being over others.

But when my son honestly told the ADS people that I had allowed him a few sips of beer at the dinner table (before his bust) this "history of substance abuse" found its way back to the school.

In the meantime, my son become increasingly depressed, withdrew from his family, and began associating with older boys who had adjusted their hopes and lifestyle to their status as students thrown out of the public schools. He stated that he no longer wanted to return to the public school, even after his expulsion was over. It was impossible for us to monitor him at the school, and the constant driving to school and back to counseling, to AA, to community service was a tremendous financial burden on us. I had expected to receive a graduate degree from a nearby university that fall, but had to set my schooling aside in order to drive my son school and back and then to AA and S.A.F.E. meetings. My wife had to taken a job in another state to support us, and it made little sense to move my there because that district there also did not accept expellees.

As a last resort, we sent my son to live with my parent in Montana, attending the same high school from which I graduated 30 years ago. Not surprisingly, the result was a complete, psychological turn around. He started getting good grades, socializing, planning to go to college and become a lawyer. Since the penalty there for possession and distribution is a 3 day suspension, School officials there expressed shock and disbelief at the circumstances of the expulsion. "We don't throw children away here" a member of the school board told me. (We provided them with copies of the hearing report and expulsion decision to assure them that in Virginia, unlike Montana, expulsion is routinely used as a first resort.) This should surprise no one, and it should raise serious questions about the real purpose of such harsh punishments in FCPS, especially since there is no effort to monitor whether or not these policies actually reduce crime in the schools or change the behavior of those punished.

In my view, the policies merely reflect the ability of one segment of the community to impose an unexamined conception of justice on everyone else's children. Included here are Alcohol and Drug services, who get to impose their belief in pharmacological determinism on the children sent them by these harsh policies.

School Board justice was often arbitrary back when 3 day expulsions were serious punishments and expulsion was a last resort, used only after other means of correction failed. It is just as arbitrary now that yearlong suspensions and expulsions are routine and the legislature continues to expand school boards' power and reduce their legal accountability.

I have since met other parents in a much worse situation than ours.

And a common theme is hearing reports, which raise the level of the crime to meet the punishment. I hope that some of them will speak up once their children are readmitted or placed in other schools.