Oh Erin! Anti-louse~ma to you! Also tons of ~ma to Brenda and continued peace~ma to Shir and all around her.

I'm so glad I went to high school before everyone went insane.

Yeah, I hear you.

To be fair, the most draconian rules usually stem from outside the school itself--Boards of Ed tend to set them because of litigation issues, and most teachers and administrators I've met think it's all annoying as hell. Also, although the rules may exist, I think it's fair to say that most students in most schools aren't going to get their bags searched randomly for Midol or Advil. It's always the most ridiculous cases which are clearly wrongheaded and stupid who get the press, though. Don't even get me started on zero-tolerance policies. I get why they exist, but seriously?? SERIOUSLY?? A little context, people, please.

I am glad I went to school pre-Columbine, for certain. That had such a huge impact on schools across the country. Things changed drastically when we came back from Spring Break that year, and they've never reverted back.

I am home. Yay. Nothing brings you closer to a new co-worker like a nit comb!

Dude, I wonder...do I have to wash EVERYTHING I own, or can I get away with bedding and all the stuff in the laundry basket (which was not in the clothes closet?)

Thank god I have hardwood floors and a leather couch.

Also, I have had several x-students who have admitted to me (after graduation) that they have carried guns and/or knives to school for protection. And we couldn't give out aspirin or Tylenol without parent permission -- we had no nurse atall, but we weren't hard core about inhalers. I did keep Tylenol in my desk, and I would discreetly give it to a few kids who I knew weren't allergic or who were over 18. And I had disposable gloves, alcohol, tweezers and band-aids in LE Drawer too, and I coldheartedly would deny or disinfect many a slice.

I laughed at kids with handnails, tho. I was all "Buy your own bandaids!" Cause the only thing that the school provided were the gloves, and that was HEPA mandated.

EDIT: CDC says only stuff I've worn in last 48 hours. Yay!!!!

About twice a year, the local police would come through the school and go around to all the lockers with a drug-sniffing dog. Never found anything, even though I know there were plenty of kids who had pot in their lockers.

And my school was very upper-middle-class suburban. No fence, no guards, no metal detectors or anything. The actual substance abuse problem (i.e., the one that landed at least ten kids in the hospital each year) was alcohol, but the one that the adults usually freaked out about was drugs.

Our town was very close to Paterson, the city in the movie Lean on Me. I heard several parents freaking out about the possibility that kids from Paterson might come into our town and sell drugs. As far as I know, that never happened. What did happen plenty was that kids from our town went into Paterson and bought drugs, and then came back and sold them to other kids from our town at a markup.

Those zero tolerance policies really should have exception clauses.

Funnily enough, in the totally not funny way, our district doesn’t have a zero tolerance policy. Looks like the school board wants one, though.

A kid should be able to take their pocket knife to the Nurse's office or something if that happens. Sheesh.

If he had taken his knife to the office first thing in the morning and explained what happened, he probably wouldn’t be in this mess. But, if you’re 13 and brought a knife to school, your first instinct would be to hide it.

To be fair, the most draconian rules usually stem from outside the school itself--Boards of Ed tend to set them because of litigation issues, and most teachers and administrators I've met think it's all annoying as hell.

So. Very. Much. This. It was our lovely School Board that expelled him. Had it been up to teachers and admin, he wouldn't have been.

Hah! My school was a weird combo of upper middle class and not...we had both an IB program and vocational ed. Academic Decathlon and gangs. State winning tennis team and metal detectors. Preps and a nursery (that was full, and kicked kids out at 6 months old). And I know I've told the story of how someone burned down the gym, twice. During the school day. (Sophomore year ('93, because it was in May) and senior year ('94, because it was in December, I graduated in '95). Yes, I apparently went to school with a slayer.

At the same time, if you were known to the administration and the teachers, you could sometimes get away with stuff...the student body president was in my upper level econ class (ten kids) and illegally ran off campus to buy us OJ and doughnuts and got caught by the principal on his way back....but we'd invited the principal to our first "Fridays where we do presentations with OJs and doughnuts" (which had quickly just degenerated to "Fridays we have OJs and doughnuts"). And the principals was like "Oh, Jeremy! It's just you, for your econ class! Of course, no problem!"

I had many kids over the years slip things to me: "Ms. G, I forgot I brought a pocketknife/prescription drugs/my cell phone/a firecracker(BWAHUH?)/Xacto for my litho project to school!"

The pocketknife? "A parent needs to pick it up, so YOU won't get in trouble." The script I would walk up with them to the office and we'd lock up after looking at the bottle label. The other stuff? I would thank the student for giving it to me and tell them they could have it back at the end of the day.

The firecracker, I flushed down the toilet. Unlit.

Why punish a kid who's trying to be good?

We did expell the girl who reached into her pocket to pull out a pencil and a 1/2 oz. of weed fell out. The other English just looked at her and was all "Why the HELL did you have that in your fricking POCKET? Why didn't you hide it in your bra, like normal people? Now we have to expell you!"

The kid was all "D'oh!"

And I pulled many a new kid up close to me, sniffed them loudly and publicly and announce "Don't. Hotbox. In. A. Car. Before. School. Again." A couple tried to brazen it out, only to have the toughest kids in school shake their heads mournfully at them and pull them aside later: "Dude, she'll bust you. SHE KNOWS!!!!"

The firecracker, I flushed down the toilet. Unlit.

I get that a lot. Only from teenagers!

I wouldn't have survived high school without advil in my purse, and at least one of my teachers who also got headaches a lot knew who also had headache meds if she was out of them. Freshman year a couple of idiot alumi decided to burn down our school we lost one building and the chem lab had some chemicals burn. Even after a thorough clean up, many of us got headaches all the time until graduation.

Having a rescue inhaler not on your person makes no sense to me .

Edited to make my words make more sense.

The idea of a kid having to get the teacher's attention, the teacher has to write a note, then the kid has to go to the nurse in order to use an inhaler is patently ridiculous!