GSOWakeFan
Cautiously Optimistic
http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/columnists/margery_eagan/2013/10/eagan_school_slaps_teen_for_doing_the_right_thing
Another example of ridiculous bureaucracy.
School slaps teen for doing the right thing
Call this another case of zero tolerance teaching zero lessons to high school kids we adults strive mightily to keep in line.
Earlier this month, 17-year-old Erin Cox, captain of North Andover’s volleyball team, finished work at the Andover Inn and then met friends at an Andover yogurt shop. There she got a cellphone message from a friend who’d been drinking at a party. She asked Erin to come get her.
Erin did.
“Don’t let friends drive drunk,” we tell our kids. “If you’ve been drinking, call mom or dad to come get you — no questions asked,” we tell them, too. “And if you can’t call your parents, call a sober friend.”
Erin’s friend called sober Erin. Erin drove to a home on Main Street in Boxford and worked her way through a wild scene of partying teens until she finally found that friend — just as police from Boxford, Haverhill, Georgetown and North Andover showed up. They arrested a dozen underage drinkers and warned another 15 underage youths that they’d be summoned to court for drinking.
Erin Cox was one of those told she’d be summoned for drinking — even though she wasn’t, even though Boxford police Officer Brian Neeley vouched for her sobriety in writing in a statement Erin’s mother, Eleanor, took to court Friday. She filed a lawsuit hoping to reverse the high school’s punishment: Erin was stripped of her captain’s position and suspended, mid-season, for five games.
“Don’t drink,” we tell our high school kids. “And don’t go to a party where kids are drinking,” we tell high school athletes, or you, too, could get suspended from the team.
Erin Cox understood all this, as well.
“But I wasn’t drinking,” she told me. “And I felt like going to get her was the right thing to do. Saving her from getting in the car when she was intoxicated and hurt herself or getting in the car with someone else who was drinking. I’d give her a ride home.”
Had police not shown up that night, we adults would likely praise Erin Cox, not punish her, for responsible judgment.
Maybe we’d have said she should’ve called her own parents or her friend’s parents or some other adult first. But that’s because we forget the cardinal teenage rule: Only tattletale to adults — and get friends in trouble — as a last, desperate resort.
Geoffrey Bok, who represented the high school in court Friday (when Eleanor Cox’s lawsuit went nowhere), said once police became involved, there was little choice.
“The school is really trying to take a very serious and principled stand regarding alcohol,” he said. And we all get that. Teen drinking is a serious problem.”
But since we adults haven’t figured out how to stop it, we send mixed messages to teenagers. We impose penalties unevenly and arbitrarily.
Kids we catch pay a price. Kids who outrun police pay none. Schools don’t really investigate who did what. And teens learn no lesson because they see no fairness. The message here, said Eleanor Cox’s lawyer, Wendy Murphy: Kids shouldn’t help each other.
Asked what she had learned, Erin Cox said, “I just feel very defeated. When you’re in high school you’re supposed to stay perfect and be perfect, but everyone makes mistakes.” Asked if, knowing what she knows now, she was mistaken to get her friend, she said she would do it all over again.
“It was the right thing,” she said.
- See more at: http://bostonherald.com/news_opinio...or_doing_the_right_thing#sthash.f2glrFor.dpuf
Another example of ridiculous bureaucracy.
School slaps teen for doing the right thing
Call this another case of zero tolerance teaching zero lessons to high school kids we adults strive mightily to keep in line.
Earlier this month, 17-year-old Erin Cox, captain of North Andover’s volleyball team, finished work at the Andover Inn and then met friends at an Andover yogurt shop. There she got a cellphone message from a friend who’d been drinking at a party. She asked Erin to come get her.
Erin did.
“Don’t let friends drive drunk,” we tell our kids. “If you’ve been drinking, call mom or dad to come get you — no questions asked,” we tell them, too. “And if you can’t call your parents, call a sober friend.”
Erin’s friend called sober Erin. Erin drove to a home on Main Street in Boxford and worked her way through a wild scene of partying teens until she finally found that friend — just as police from Boxford, Haverhill, Georgetown and North Andover showed up. They arrested a dozen underage drinkers and warned another 15 underage youths that they’d be summoned to court for drinking.
Erin Cox was one of those told she’d be summoned for drinking — even though she wasn’t, even though Boxford police Officer Brian Neeley vouched for her sobriety in writing in a statement Erin’s mother, Eleanor, took to court Friday. She filed a lawsuit hoping to reverse the high school’s punishment: Erin was stripped of her captain’s position and suspended, mid-season, for five games.
“Don’t drink,” we tell our high school kids. “And don’t go to a party where kids are drinking,” we tell high school athletes, or you, too, could get suspended from the team.
Erin Cox understood all this, as well.
“But I wasn’t drinking,” she told me. “And I felt like going to get her was the right thing to do. Saving her from getting in the car when she was intoxicated and hurt herself or getting in the car with someone else who was drinking. I’d give her a ride home.”
Had police not shown up that night, we adults would likely praise Erin Cox, not punish her, for responsible judgment.
Maybe we’d have said she should’ve called her own parents or her friend’s parents or some other adult first. But that’s because we forget the cardinal teenage rule: Only tattletale to adults — and get friends in trouble — as a last, desperate resort.
Geoffrey Bok, who represented the high school in court Friday (when Eleanor Cox’s lawsuit went nowhere), said once police became involved, there was little choice.
“The school is really trying to take a very serious and principled stand regarding alcohol,” he said. And we all get that. Teen drinking is a serious problem.”
But since we adults haven’t figured out how to stop it, we send mixed messages to teenagers. We impose penalties unevenly and arbitrarily.
Kids we catch pay a price. Kids who outrun police pay none. Schools don’t really investigate who did what. And teens learn no lesson because they see no fairness. The message here, said Eleanor Cox’s lawyer, Wendy Murphy: Kids shouldn’t help each other.
Asked what she had learned, Erin Cox said, “I just feel very defeated. When you’re in high school you’re supposed to stay perfect and be perfect, but everyone makes mistakes.” Asked if, knowing what she knows now, she was mistaken to get her friend, she said she would do it all over again.
“It was the right thing,” she said.
- See more at: http://bostonherald.com/news_opinio...or_doing_the_right_thing#sthash.f2glrFor.dpuf
