Education Notebook

Pine Island: Threats of gunplay over Facebook still not a good idea (article)

I'll blame this on a generation gap, but not just because "parents just don't understand."

Apparently, a 17-year-old Oronoco boy allegedly threatened to bring a gun to Pine Island High School and kill a classmate during a conversation on Facebook. (Here's the story from the PB's Laura Horihan) Fast forward to today, the boy isn't in school and deputies from the Olmsted County Sheriff's Office are investigating.

I don't think kids understand the power of the written word anymore. It's one thing to say, "I'm going to kill you." It's another thing to write a ransom note, that says "I'm going to bring a gun to school and kill you." Kids don't understand that comments over Facebook, e-mail, anything that can be tracked with a papertrail/cybertrail, will always carry more weight than the playground or lunchroom "he said, she said." Also, there's no "I'm just joking" font face.

School administration will obviously frown on both instances. But when there's tangible evidence (the letter) as well as a method for how you plan to inflict harm (the gun), people are going to be (rightly) concerned.

Now, the 17-year-old said he has been getting picked on, too. And that should be dealt with by school officials, assuming someone notifies them of the situation. I don't want to blame the victim, but there are other ways to report bullying than threatening to equip yourself like Ted Nugent on a hunting excursion.

At least two things need to happen here: the student needs to be informed that threats over Facebook are handled very seriously AND the bullying of said student needs to stop. The other suspects in this incident -- the ones picking on another student to the point where he feels the need to inflict violence -- need to receive their day in the principal's office, too.

Just my $.02.

LINK: Pine Island student removed after Facebook death threat (article)

Century High to students: Get a watch. Use it.

Century High has started a program to punish tardiness -- every time a student is late to class, he or she is assigned 25-minutes of lunch detention.

Here are some stats. Last year at this time, about 300 students received at least one tardy each week. Of those, 100 students were late multiple times. The school has about 1,600 students. This year, that number has dropped to about 120 students, with 25 kids being late multiple times, according to statistics provided by administrative assistant Kurt Verdoorn.

So apparently, the program is working. Granted, students aren't happy about it. As someone who recalls racking up the tardies as an upperclassman -- I'll never know why getting to KFC was so important, but making it back to fifth hour wasn't -- I can see the problem. Actually, in fifth grade I missed the bus enough times (and had to walk), that my fifth-grade teacher gave me an alarm clock. Rebel without a clue, I guess.

It makes perfect sense that staff members would want students in class, rather than roaming the halls, straggling late into class, or off in the parking lot doing whatever kids are do in the parking lot.

Anyway, most students said they should get some leeway during first hour, but that the program is otherwise fair during the school day. I have a full story coming in Wednesday's paper. I'll update this with a link when it goes live.