Posted on 09/24/2006 6:49:17 AM PDT by freepatriot32
With student molestations skyrocketing, lawmakers demand weapon in drug fight
WASHINGTON – Even though student molestations seem to be reaching epidemic proportions in schools across America, the House of Representatives has approved a tough new anti-drug and anti-weapon law that would require local districts to develop search policies – including strip searches – with immunity against prosecution for teachers and staff.
Schools would have to develop policies for searching students, or face the loss of some federal funding, under the bill – HR 5295, approved by a voice vote Tuesday. It moves to the Senate, which does not have similar legislation pending at this time.
The American Civil Liberties Union, the American Federation of Teachers, the Drug Policy Alliance, Students for Sensible Drug Policy, the National Parent Teacher Association, the American Association of School Administrators and the National School Boards Association all opposed the bill saying it could invite unconstitutional searches. The National Education Association supports the legislation, according to the sponsor.
The bill was the brainchild of Rep. Geoff Davis, R-Kentucky, who said the idea was to "put a process in place so that the teachers don't have any fear of liability, but at the same time it protects the rights of the students from an unreasonable search."
The bill says only that search methods cannot be "excessively intrusive."
It drew opposition from the American Federation of Teachers, a smaller teachers union, and the American Civil Liberties Union.
The "Student Teacher Safety Act of 2006" passed on a voice vote, bypassing the committee process and with no way to hold individual members of the House accountable for their votes.
Particularly controversial is the requirement that each local school district have search policies in place, with the process defined like this:
"A search referred to in subsection (a) is a search by a full-time teacher or school official, acting on any reasonable suspicion based on professional experience and judgment, of any minor student on the grounds of any public school, if the search is conducted to ensure that classrooms, school buildings, school property and students remain free from the threat of all weapons, dangerous materials, or illegal narcotics. The measures used to conduct any search must be reasonably related to the search's objectives, without being excessively intrusive in light of the student's age, sex, and the nature of the offense."
The bill does not address whether body cavity searches are included, whether training will be provided to staffers performing them, whether background checks on staffers would be necessary, whether students who have been sexually abused in the past would be subject or whether parental notification would be required. Without those specifics, the judgment of local school administrators will be the litmus test.
Some fear the mandate for random, warrantless searches of every student, at any time, on any pretext – with immunity from prosecution – could create problems worse than drugs and weapons on campus.
Rep. George Miller of California, the senior Democrat on the House committee that oversees education issues, called the legislation an intrusion into local affairs.
"Schools and school districts already have policies in place regarding student searches," Miller said. "Those policies are the product of consultation with local administrators, teachers and parents. They take in the concerns of the community."
The Education Department has not taken a position on the legislation.
WND has documented the incidents of teacher-student sex throughout the country – particularly the new trend of female teachers molesting male students. WND news editor Joe Kovacs, who has spearheaded the research on this trend, is scheduled to appear Wednesday on "The O'Reilly Factor" on the Fox News Channel to discuss the issue.
It will be here sooner than later, "WE" keep giving up our rights, where will it end... : ) <<< me
"That's right. Kids need to be in some kind of "school." But except in extreme instances, this has been interpreted quite broadly."
By "extreme" circumstances, you imply that the abuse of power by school authorities is unusual. The facts belie a different reality. School authorities are continually abusing their regulatory power with regard to parents who choose alternative educational paths for their children, i.e. home education. The HSLDA archives are replete with instances where school authorities have overstepped their bounds in this regard.
On a related note, I do find your posts interesting. It's not often that I get to debate with someone who is both very intelligent as well as utterly disingenuous in their treatment of the subject matter at hand. Thank you for the repartee.
"Not if you home school."
I wish it were so.
The truth is, it depends on where you're at. If you're in a state like Oklahoma which does not regulate homeschooling, then what you're saying is generally, but not universally, true. Unfortunately, those who live in states like Pennsylvania and Massachusetts face a much different reality.
But I suspect you already knew that.
Another problem I have with random searches is of one student planting drugs in another's locker, either by breaking in or slipping something in through the vents. Then he could blow in the set up student who would be innocent. This could ruin a kids life.
Coming in for searches without good cause and reasonable suspicion is kind of like the *Find me the man and I'll find the crime* mentality. It endangers the whole innocent until proven guilty philosophy.
But the "resource officer" wouldn't ever search you, which was cherry's point.
"What are you talking about? Drug dogs come in every year to all schools in my county. It's routine. The kids are in their rooms and the dogs go from locker to locker and from car to car. There are not there to intimidate, there are there to find the remnants of drugs. No one ever sees them -- especially the students.If there is a personal emergency the principal will come down and escort the kid to the bathroom when it the dogs are out of the area--exactly so that the kids are NOT traumatized!"
What I find stunning about your post is that you view such searches as routine and perhaps meritorious. When did it become acceptable to run government schools on a security model that is starkly reminiscent of a prison?
When did it become acceptable to run government schools on a security model that is starkly reminiscent of a prison?--When parents as a whole abdicated their responsibility of teaching character to their children and asked the schools to do it. We have what we have because largely parents want us to be the heavy. That way they can be the best friend of the kid while standing against the mean ol' school teacher who makes them do classwork.
I don't think it is an ideal situation in the least. Far from it. We were better off when parents and teachers respected each other and worked together with the parents took the lead in terms of character education. The government makes for a poor parent, which is what the government is asked to be by more people than you can imagine.
The only real adults 20 years from now will be those whose parents taught them how to be adults--not those who were taught those aspects by the schools or by the police. That doesn't mean that all public school kids are losers--but I will say that all public school kids whose parents gave up on them when they were 5 will be sad excuses for adults.
...worked together with the parents taking the lead in terms of character... sorry, my fingers type faster than my brain sometimes.
"The government makes for a poor parent, which is what the government is asked to be by more people than you can imagine."
Oh, I don't know about that. I'm a pretty imaginative kinda guy. :-)
Your post is a good one. Particularly the last paragraph.
I'm just trying to teach reading and English as best I can to a bunch of kids whose parents give as little attention to as possible. I'm not even sure why some parents have kids, except to look pretty when they are babies on Christmas cards.
Bullshit.
Presidio9-"Bullshit."
Only if said right is granted, which zook seems willing to do on behalf of everybody else.
Tax-supported education is not a right. If students are disruptive, delinquent, or unwilling to learn, they need to be expelled permanently. The Feds should end any involvement in public education, even funding. The state legislatures should in turn back away from meddling in local school board affairs, and disband their state education bureaucracies.
Professor excuse me but do you even have a clue as to where that practice originated in the United States? I'll tell you what in the very county that misguided practice began there is not even one Snake Handling School. But then again that county can't keep the school buses running either. Actually it was a peaceful community until last year. Seems the Mega High School despite all security measures taken didn't stop a kid from killing the assistant principal and wounding two others. He was on his way to the principals office so I doubt a strip search would have mattered anyway.
Not so long ago that county had at least 4 high schools located in the rural communities. No major problems occurred as the principals knew their community and their students. Most of them knew the parents as well. Then it went from 4-5 high schools down to two. That's when all the woes began including funding and discipline.
I'm going to let you in on something. Liberals created this mess. First the USSC which many in here seem to adore ruled prayer in schools was Unconstitutional going against every written document both public and private of the founding fathers on separation of church and state and what it actually meant. Next came the elimination of any public prayer at any school function all together. Hail to the secular public education system. Can anyone stand against it's might?
Teachers who did care about the students enough to do intervention soon became the targets of the Liberal Courts. Abe Lincoln said the following and it's so very true " Abe Lincoln said, "The philosophy of the classroom in one generation, Will be the philosophy of government of the next."
Yes two generations now of secular humanism with an absence of any mention of GOD in school has taken it's toll. Spiritual Laws are much like scientific laws. For example actually there is no such thing as cold. It is merely an absence of heat. Removing moral principles that this very nation was founded on from public schools has left an absence of knowledge of right from wrong. Yes parents share a huge portion of fault as well. But remember this in public funded universities in the 60's and 70's even through the present any professor or school teacher can say there is no GOD but none better call on his name. GOD was expelled from public school by one woman and the USSC who supported her. GOD will not be where he is not asked to be. That is spiritual law. When you kick GOD out you give the devil himself permission to fill the void.
Now then. Our so called enlightened leaders in Washington DC ignore the wisdom of even the most removed founder of this nation from traditional Christianity. Even Thomas Jefferson the most secular of them all would be spitting nails at what the public education system and USSC have done.
I find it very difficult to allow any school official permission to do strip searches when they are stupid & blind enough as to allow satanic bibles in school libraries but not the Holy Bible. Such as these will never understand why they have a problem to start with. They are a clueless lot indeed. The U.S. Department of Education needs to be closed down. Local governments need to encourage the organizing of church and private sector ran schools and stay out of their hair. They did an excellent job for most of this nations history. The only public schools should be local ones actually individual schools that have a specific written charter and approved by a local community vote accountable solely to a local community school board and parents for policy. The right of any parent to opt out their portion of tax money to fund such a school should as well be the law of the land.
I can make up my own mind, thank you. There are some of us in the great, ignorant, unwashed masses that don't like people making decisions for us, all for our own good, of course. But then the intellectual elite always seem think they know what's best for everyone else and try to impose it on them, whether they like it or not. Count me out.
Uh, I'm on your side in this dogfight.
I know. Just venting.
Good job.
"But then the intellectual elite always seem think they know what's best for everyone else and try to impose it on them, whether they like it or not. Count me out."
The only thing these "elitists" bring the people in the end is tyranny, pain, and suffering.
Two good examples of such people are hitler and stalin.
They would have been all for this.
"But speaking from my own experience--it is not done that way in my middle school or in the local high schools in VA"
Not yet...But with this new law protecting school officials and police from outrages like what occured in SC, prepare your students to submit to the barrel of a gun.
Not one school official nor one police official was punished for what occured at that SC high school prior to this law. Obviously it wasn't a common transgression by school officials or police for fear of lawsuits and dismissals. But with this new law to protect them, abuses of children like that witnessed in my 260 will be coming to a school near you very soon.
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