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Chandler (AZ) boy suspended for sketching gun
East Valley Tribune ^ | August 21, 2007 | David Biscobing

Posted on 08/22/2007 5:17:53 AM PDT by radar101

Family members provided an image as an example of the sketch drawn by the boy. PROVIDED

An East Valley eighth-grader was suspended this week after he turned in homework with a sketch that school officials said resembled a gun and posed a threat to his classmates.

But parents of the 13-year-old, who attends Payne Junior High School in the Chandler Unified School District, said the drawing was a harmless doodle of a fake laser, and school officials overreacted.

“I just can’t believe that there wasn’t another way to resolve this,” said Paula Mosteller, the boy’s mother. “He’s so upset. The school made him feel like he committed a crime. They are doing more damage than good.”

Payne Junior High officials did not allow the Tribune to view the drawing. The Mostellers said the drawing did not depict blood, injuries, bullets or any human targets. They said it was just a drawing that resembled a gun.

But Payne Junior High administrators determined that was enough to constitute a gun threat and gave the boy a five-day suspension that was later reduced to three days.

The Tribune isn’t publishing the boy’s first name at the request of his parents.

The suspension follows an unrelated incident earlier this month in which Gilbert police were called to Payne Junior High School to investigate a rumor of a girl bringing a gun on campus. No gun was found and a letter was sent home to parents.

In the letter, school officials told parents about the incident and indicated there would be a zero-tolerance policy toward gun threats.

Chandler district spokesman Terry Locke said the school is not allowed to discuss students’ discipline records. However, he said the sketch was “absolutely considered a threat,” and threatening words or pictures are punished.

The school did not contact police about the threat and did not provide counseling or an evaluation to the boy to determine if he intended the drawing as a threat.

The Mostellers said their son has no discipline record at the school because they just moved from Colorado this year.

The sketch was one of several drawings scratched in the margins of a science assignment that was turned in on Friday. The boy said he never meant for the picture to be seen as a threat. He said he was just drawing because he finished an assignment early.

School officials issued the suspension on Monday afternoon and notified the student’s father, Ben. He met with school officials and persuaded them to shorten the suspension from five days to three.

A second student was also suspended Monday for a sketch on his homework. However, that student and his parents could not be reached for comment about the nature of that drawing.

Ben Mosteller was allowed to see his son’s drawing at the school but was not permitted to make a copy to bring home to his wife.

Paula Mosteller said she has been unable to reach the school’s principal, Karen Martin, or the vice principal, Dave Constance, since Monday to talk about the suspension. Martin and Constance did not return several phone calls to the school for comment.

When Ben Mosteller came to the school to discuss his son’s punishment, he said school officials mentioned the seriousness of the issue and talked about the massacre at Columbine High School — the site where two teenagers shot and killed 12 students and injured 24 others in 1999 at Littleton, Colo.

The Mostellers said the Columbine reference was extreme and offensive. They have contacted the district’s governing board about the incident.

“We understand that there was zero tolerance and the sketch could look like a gun, but the way this was handled was so horribly wrong,” Paula Mosteller said. “Hopefully, when my son goes back to school on Friday this will all be behind him. But a school accusing a child like this can have a huge effect on a child for the rest of his life.”


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Government; Politics/Elections; US: Arizona
KEYWORDS: art; banglist; discipline; education; ohfercryinoutloud; publicschools; stuckonstupid; zerotolerance
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1 posted on 08/22/2007 5:17:54 AM PDT by radar101
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To: radar101

That’s why my kids, if I ever have any, aren’t going to government schools.


2 posted on 08/22/2007 5:20:22 AM PDT by Perdogg (Cheney for President 2008)
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To: radar101

Things like this are why I homeschool. Its ok to show pictures and provide instruction for anal sex but a picture resembling a firearm is verbotten.


3 posted on 08/22/2007 5:21:09 AM PDT by driftdiver
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To: radar101
a sketch that school officials said resembled a gun and posed a threat to his classmates.

If he had drawn a picture of a building on fire, would they have to evacuate the school?

4 posted on 08/22/2007 5:21:20 AM PDT by Puppage (You may disagree with what I have to say, but I shall defend to your death my right to say it)
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To: radar101

What a bunch of limp wristed, panties in a wad, air wasting, blithering idiots.


5 posted on 08/22/2007 5:22:30 AM PDT by Scotsman will be Free (11C - Indirect fire, infantry - High angle hell - We will bring you, FIRE)
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To: Scotsman will be Free
What a bunch of limp wristed, panties in a wad, air wasting, blithering idiots.

Who will be electing our next president.
6 posted on 08/22/2007 5:24:57 AM PDT by mutley
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To: radar101

Man, had schoolteachers been this insane in the 80’s, I would have had my life screwed-up by all sorts of psychologists and counselors. I drew this stuff all day, and now I’m in the military.


7 posted on 08/22/2007 5:25:39 AM PDT by Lusis ("Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself.")
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To: radar101
Terry Locke is an idiot who desperately needs an evaluation by a good shrink.

The whole school board should be voted out and all administrators fired.

This insanity has got to stop.

When I was young, I always wondered how rational people could put folks on trial for the heinous crime of “witch craft” and then EXECUTE them for it. I just couldn’t believe that adults could succumb to this kind of hysteria.

Now I know, yes they can. We see this insanity ever day.

I really wish that some fool who really believes this nonsense would debate me on the issue. I know they won’t.

8 posted on 08/22/2007 5:26:46 AM PDT by Al Gator (Refusing to "stoop to your enemy's level", gets you cut off at the knees.)
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To: mutley

Morons; school officials today are gutless morons being run in circles by liberals.

I used to sit and doodle whole war battle scenes during study hall in the 1960’s; complete with jets strafing the commies.

As long as they keep this asinine crap up I will continue to vote no on their pleas for more money.


9 posted on 08/22/2007 5:27:14 AM PDT by WBL 1952
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To: WBL 1952
This is so stupid, one almost thinks it needs to be checked by Snopes because it is so off the wall that it couldn't possibly be true.

Unfortunately, I think it is. We have gone totally beserk~

10 posted on 08/22/2007 5:31:14 AM PDT by basil (Support the Second Amendment--buy another gun today!)
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To: radar101

I wudda been expelled.


11 posted on 08/22/2007 5:31:33 AM PDT by Lonesome in Massachussets (NYT Headline: Protocols of the Learned Elders of CBS: Fake but Accurate, Experts Say)
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To: radar101
school officials mentioned the seriousness of the issue and talked about the massacre at Columbine High School — the site where two teenagers shot and killed 12 students and injured 24 others in 1999 at Littleton, Colo.

And that is why liberals and people like this have no business in education

12 posted on 08/22/2007 5:32:16 AM PDT by Charlespg (Peace= When we trod the ruins of Mecca and Medina under our infidel boots.)
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To: radar101
OMG! I hope the boy didn’t hurt anyone with that graphite image. (Shaking my head in utter disbelief)
13 posted on 08/22/2007 5:34:31 AM PDT by 4yearlurker (All comments now being monitored by BOR. He's looking out for you!)
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To: radar101

WE need to take BACK our country.


14 posted on 08/22/2007 5:35:49 AM PDT by tioga
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To: Puppage
If he had drawn a picture of a building on fire, would they have to evacuate the school?

Yes, and they'd have charged him with attempted arson, no doubt.

15 posted on 08/22/2007 5:36:56 AM PDT by theDentist (Qwerty ergo typo : I type, therefore I misspelll.)
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To: tioga

And these lefties who create these policies blame BUSH for curtailing rights?? What a joke.

So this kid gets in trouble while how many kids with *real* guns are out there? I guess they can’t be touched because searching them would be a violation of rights, or even worse a case of racial profiling.


16 posted on 08/22/2007 5:39:17 AM PDT by TNCMAXQ
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To: radar101

any parents stupid enough to enroll their children in a public school deserve whatever will surely happen to them.


17 posted on 08/22/2007 5:39:25 AM PDT by martin gibson ("I care not what course others may take, but as for myself, give me Ralph Stanley or give me death")
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To: radar101
Your tax dollars at work.

Were this my kid, I'd have him drawing guns every day just to agitate the school nazis.

18 posted on 08/22/2007 5:39:30 AM PDT by meyer (It's the entitlements, stupid!)
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To: Puppage
Hypocritical liberals. The boy drew a picture of a gun for crying out loud. He was only expressing himself. That's what liberals want isn't it; for people to express themselves? Oh, that's right, this was somehow a "hate crime". This is why liberals cannot be allowed to run this country.
19 posted on 08/22/2007 5:39:34 AM PDT by Arcy
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bump


20 posted on 08/22/2007 5:40:36 AM PDT by wolfinator
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