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Is Zero Tolerance Too Much?

Aired October 24, 2003 - 14:35   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Rachel Boim was expelled under her school's zero tolerance policy. The deadly shootings by Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold at Columbine High School led public schools nationwide to enact the policy.
Can zero tolerance actually stop troubled teens? And is it unfair? We'll debate this issue with our guest. Krista Kafer is an education policy analyst with the Heritage Foundation. Good morning -- or good afternoon. Thanks so much for being here.

And Howard Hastings is a professor and father of the son who was expelled under such a policy. Thanks for being here as well.

I want to ask the both of you, is there any such thing as a fair no tolerance policy? Or don't these cases have to be looked at one by one? Howard?

HOWARD HASTINGS, ENDZEROTOLERANCE.COM: Well, that's my feeling. Yes, they do have to be looked at one by one. And my view, educators have traditionally had a parental responsibility for the well being of children in their care.

Along with this responsibility, has come the reasonable right to discipline them. Traditionally, this meant expulsion was always a last resort, used only after other means had failed. When this is the first resort this fundamentally alters the relation between educators and children. It increases the right to discipline without correspondingly increasing the responsibility for the child's well being. In fact, that's correspondingly decreased.

COLLINS: But Miss K, let me then ask you, what is a teacher to do to keep their classroom safe, especially after Columbine, which you are a graduate of that school?

KRISTA KAFER, EDUCATION POLICY ANALYST, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: Yes, I am a graduate of Columbine High School. And I think a little bit more sensitive, and perhaps a little bit more willing to look at the situation from the school's perspective.

If we look at Columbine, we had teachers that had looked at some of the writings of the two student, the two murderers, who would go on to murder, that is. And they -- these kids were -- there were warning signs. These kids had written things that were violent. The teachers reported it to the principal but nothing happened. There was no real clear standards or responsibilities for handling these students. I guess the pendulum has now swung the other direction, and now schools have kind of very clear standards and a responsibility and a chain of command, how to handle these situations. And perhaps they are one size fits all. Maybe they can be a little too severe.

But the schools really are thinking in the terms of the best interest of the children as a whole. I mean, what is the greater good? The greater good is the safety of the 2,200-odd kids that are at that Georgia school. That's the main responsibility of those administrators and as such I think they acted rightly in taking the situation seriously.

COLLINS: Mr. Hastings, let me ask if you can refresh everyone's memory, why was your son expelled and what happened to him?

HASTINGS: When my son was 14-years-old, we were in the Fairfax County, Virginia school system. He had no discipline record and good grades. But he made a mistake. He purchased a small amount of marijuana, brought a joint to school and gave it to a friend.

For this, he was required to finish all the work for the quarter and fail that work. He was expelled, required to do 60 hours of community service and forbidden from ever attending the local high school.

In order to manage all the difficulties that went with this -- I'm only giving you a few of them here -- we eventually had to send him to live with my parents in Montana for his freshman year. Had we not been able to do that, I'm very sure he problem in the juvenile system now in some capacity.

COLLINS: Mr. Hastings, what sort of punishment do you think your son should receive?

HASTINGS: Well, in the Montana school, he would have receive eight weeks of drug awareness education. I think for a first offense, that's appropriate.

COLLINS: Obviously, this is a very different scenario. Possibly it would be fair to say, less threatening than this latest story could have been interpreted.

Miss Kafer, what do you think should be done here? Is there leeway between the zero tolerance and the case by case basis?

KAFER: Well there are ways that you can modify that, obviously. You can have, you know, scale offenses so that -- for a first offense, things can be handled differently. I'm glad they'll revisit the situation with the student, with the parents, and look at it again.

But I do think it's important that we do understand why the school has reacted the way it has. It is a different age. Ten years ago, a story like this might have warranted a teacher to sit down with a parent and a student and say, hey, what's going on here.

But we now live in an age where -- I mean there was one year where there were several tragedies. Columbine being the worst. But there were others. People scratched their heads, said, how could we have not seen the warning signs, or why didn't people react on the warning signs?

That's the day we live in now, we have to take these kind of things very, very seriously.

COLLINS: Thank you so very much, Krista Kafer from Washington and the Heritage Foundation. And Howard Hastings out of Pittsburgh this morning -- this afternoon. I do morning TV, sorry, guys. Thanks so very much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired October 24, 2003 - 14:35   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Rachel Boim was expelled under her school's zero tolerance policy. The deadly shootings by Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold at Columbine High School led public schools nationwide to enact the policy.
Can zero tolerance actually stop troubled teens? And is it unfair? We'll debate this issue with our guest. Krista Kafer is an education policy analyst with the Heritage Foundation. Good morning -- or good afternoon. Thanks so much for being here.

And Howard Hastings is a professor and father of the son who was expelled under such a policy. Thanks for being here as well.

I want to ask the both of you, is there any such thing as a fair no tolerance policy? Or don't these cases have to be looked at one by one? Howard?

HOWARD HASTINGS, ENDZEROTOLERANCE.COM: Well, that's my feeling. Yes, they do have to be looked at one by one. And my view, educators have traditionally had a parental responsibility for the well being of children in their care.

Along with this responsibility, has come the reasonable right to discipline them. Traditionally, this meant expulsion was always a last resort, used only after other means had failed. When this is the first resort this fundamentally alters the relation between educators and children. It increases the right to discipline without correspondingly increasing the responsibility for the child's well being. In fact, that's correspondingly decreased.

COLLINS: But Miss K, let me then ask you, what is a teacher to do to keep their classroom safe, especially after Columbine, which you are a graduate of that school?

KRISTA KAFER, EDUCATION POLICY ANALYST, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: Yes, I am a graduate of Columbine High School. And I think a little bit more sensitive, and perhaps a little bit more willing to look at the situation from the school's perspective.

If we look at Columbine, we had teachers that had looked at some of the writings of the two student, the two murderers, who would go on to murder, that is. And they -- these kids were -- there were warning signs. These kids had written things that were violent. The teachers reported it to the principal but nothing happened. There was no real clear standards or responsibilities for handling these students. I guess the pendulum has now swung the other direction, and now schools have kind of very clear standards and a responsibility and a chain of command, how to handle these situations. And perhaps they are one size fits all. Maybe they can be a little too severe.

But the schools really are thinking in the terms of the best interest of the children as a whole. I mean, what is the greater good? The greater good is the safety of the 2,200-odd kids that are at that Georgia school. That's the main responsibility of those administrators and as such I think they acted rightly in taking the situation seriously.

COLLINS: Mr. Hastings, let me ask if you can refresh everyone's memory, why was your son expelled and what happened to him?

HASTINGS: When my son was 14-years-old, we were in the Fairfax County, Virginia school system. He had no discipline record and good grades. But he made a mistake. He purchased a small amount of marijuana, brought a joint to school and gave it to a friend.

For this, he was required to finish all the work for the quarter and fail that work. He was expelled, required to do 60 hours of community service and forbidden from ever attending the local high school.

In order to manage all the difficulties that went with this -- I'm only giving you a few of them here -- we eventually had to send him to live with my parents in Montana for his freshman year. Had we not been able to do that, I'm very sure he problem in the juvenile system now in some capacity.

COLLINS: Mr. Hastings, what sort of punishment do you think your son should receive?

HASTINGS: Well, in the Montana school, he would have receive eight weeks of drug awareness education. I think for a first offense, that's appropriate.

COLLINS: Obviously, this is a very different scenario. Possibly it would be fair to say, less threatening than this latest story could have been interpreted.

Miss Kafer, what do you think should be done here? Is there leeway between the zero tolerance and the case by case basis?

KAFER: Well there are ways that you can modify that, obviously. You can have, you know, scale offenses so that -- for a first offense, things can be handled differently. I'm glad they'll revisit the situation with the student, with the parents, and look at it again.

But I do think it's important that we do understand why the school has reacted the way it has. It is a different age. Ten years ago, a story like this might have warranted a teacher to sit down with a parent and a student and say, hey, what's going on here.

But we now live in an age where -- I mean there was one year where there were several tragedies. Columbine being the worst. But there were others. People scratched their heads, said, how could we have not seen the warning signs, or why didn't people react on the warning signs?

That's the day we live in now, we have to take these kind of things very, very seriously.

COLLINS: Thank you so very much, Krista Kafer from Washington and the Heritage Foundation. And Howard Hastings out of Pittsburgh this morning -- this afternoon. I do morning TV, sorry, guys. Thanks so very much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com