AKA, reason #1737:

A seven year old boy at Dennis Township Primary School in Cape May County, N.J., was suspended for a day for drawing this picture:

The ACLU spokeswoman said it best: "What are they accomplishing by keeping that child home?"

Amusingly, the AP took it seriously enough that it wouldn’t mention the name of the other boy in the picture ("david").

Schools’ (and others’) like to tout their "zero tolerance" policies for drugs, weapons, bullying, and so forth; it’s supposed to sound strong and tough and all those good things.

In reality, though, if a school district has a zero tolerance policy, what it means is "we don’t trust our teachers and administrators."

Zero tolerance is like the beepers on McDonalds’ fry vats. It’s there because you don’t believe the people in charge are smart enough to make their own decisions.

That’s why you end up with students suspended, expelled, or arrested over stupid things — pointing a finger the wrong way, or sketching the wrong thing, or having a butter knife in your locker.

School administrators defend these decisions by pointing to Columbine or Virginia Tech and saying that zero tolerance is the only way to avoid another one. The girl with the butter knife today could be toting an AK-47 and an attitude tomorrow, you see.

Translation: We don’t trust our staff to differentiate between a real threat (e.g., the kids who post on Facebook their detailed plans of how and who they’re going to kill) and innocuous mistakes (e.g., the kid who left a Swiss Army Knife in his glove compartment.).

The thing is, anyone with an ounce of intelligence can tell the difference. So putting zero tolerance policies in place says the school districts don’t think the teachers are that smart.

And what does that tell us?

South Carolina teen accidentally brings butter knife (!) to school. Teacher sees it when it falls from her locker. Student expelled.

Welcome to Goose Creek High School, and it’s idiot principal, one Jimmy Huskey. (I’m not being snide. He really is listed as "Jimmy" on the site.)

I wonder what lesson he thinks he’s teaching. I wonder what good he thinks he’s doing. Maybe he like the idea of screwing up a kid’s life over a small, harmless mistake; maybe it’s a power trip.

Or maybe he’s just an idiot.

The Berkeley County school district lists on its Web page that it believes in "staff members who are highly qualified and effective." How, I wonder, do they explain this genius? (Answer: It also believes in "A safe learning environment As evidenced by… security procedures that are followed."

Bottom line is that it’s more proof that the best and brightest aren’t leading our public schools.