Earthside Comments: Here is another one. Obviously there are school districts around the country that already have way too much taxpayer money if they have time to engage in the kind of anti-American activities described in the news reports below.
Important to note: the kids' videos were not made in the school, on school time or with school equipment. If threats were made, it would be a police matter -- apparently that was not the case, so the administrators are behaving like petty tyrants. If what was in the videos was slanderous, there are civil courts to utilize.
What was in the videos may have been in poor taste, rude, or perhaps even cuttingly humorous. But in the old United States where the Bill of Rights still had meaning and was respected, the right to express oneself through speech and/or actions was a critical ingredient of freedom.
School administrators like those in this incident really have completely forgotten that their job is to facilitate education, not intrude themselves in other people's words or behavior, especially off campus.
Yet another example of life in Bush's America.
Link: Green (Ohio) Teens Suspended for Videos | Akron Beacon Journal/Ohio.com
Ten Green High School juniors have been suspended for 10 school days for producing videos that made fun of staff and students.
The teenage boys placed the videos on the popular YouTube Internet site.
The suspensions, given out last week by principal Gary Geis, began on Friday.
The suspensions, school officials said, will mean the teens will be out of school six days ending this Friday. They will return to school on Tuesday and serve four days of in-school suspension.
They will be permitted to take their semester final exams that got under way this week.
Superintendent Wade E. Lucas, who was holding suspension appeal hearings for several of the students and their parents Tuesday afternoon, said school policy says that if a student is suspended and misses a test, he or she will receive a zero grade. But he said that stipulation has been waived in this instance.
Lucas declined to release many details about the students or what was posted on the Internet, but he said school equipment was not used to make the videos.
He said four videos were made and then posted on YouTube.
The videos were discovered on the Internet last Thursday after word spread about the postings.
The videos were subsequently removed.
''They (the students) made a bad decision,'' Lucas said.
The students are also prohibited from participating in any extracurricular activities, including sports.
Link: 9 Students Suspended For YouTube Videos | Associated Press/nbc4i.com
Nine teenagers near Akron have been suspended from their high school for making videos that ridicule school staff and students. The videos were posted online.
The students from Green High School were suspended for 10 days after school officials discovered the four videos on the Internet site YouTube last Thursday. The videos have since been removed from the site.
Principal Gary Geis says the videos poke fun at teachers and classmates. The students' identities weren't released.
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