The Box

Back when I was in "Junior High," you know, when you only had to endure two years instead of three in that pre-adolescent phase!, we had something called "The Box." Not many students were intimately familiar with "The Box," only a select few disobedient students ever really saw the inside of it. Those students and all the band students (that would be me!) knew that the box was a small room in the basement near the band room of our Junior High, with 6 enclosed areas each containing a desk, a chair and four walls covered in some very profane graffiti. The other name for "The Box" that was used by the middle aged staff at the school and parents who had the unfortunately experience of being familiar with it was in-house suspension. "The Box" was definitely a threat. It was worse than staying home alone, watching TV and being grounded for weeks on end. You see, if you were in "the box" you actually had to do your schoolwork. Now everyone knows that not having to do your schoolwork, even if you lose the credit, is just not worse than having to do it in the solitude of a closet with nary a soul to interact with.

In the Washington Post there was an article today about just this very thing, although the option of in-house suspension was not really discussed at any length that I could find. The article was mostly about out of school suspension and it's ineffectiveness. I was actually revolted by the example they gave in this article. It makes it seem as though the parents not only participated in this "scuffle" at the bus stop, resulting in two sisters being suspended, but actually seems to indicate the parents were incensed that their children would be suspended for this act. Maybe I'm just not reading this incident carefully enough, but I'm all for suspension in this incident, especially because the parents are involved, if that is the case. Unfortunately, suspension only works if the parents actually take it seriously.

Reading on, it would appear from the article that at least one of the teachers was reluctant to abide by the "suspension without credit" that was imposed on these students. This is high school! This is a consequence of aggressive behavior. Am I missing something here??? Life is not always fair and our kids learn that at a very young age.

I just attended a parent teacher conference for my second grader, who had a near perfect report card except for one "W" - which mean "with help" even though none is ever given! - in Social Studies. I'm not that concerned about this particular subject, but I figured I better find out what the cause for such a grade could be, considering everything she had brought home (like the state report that we spent weeks on!) had all "I"'s on them. The teacher pulled out a grade book, found one 33% that we don't ever recall seeing, and basically told us sometimes one bad grade can pull your whole grade down. Did she feel reluctant to count it towards my seven year old daughter's grade? Apparently not!! So, at the mere age of 7, my daughter knows that if she gets one bad grade amidst her 90's and 100's, she will be penalized. I should think that teenagers would have figured that out by now. So - if you really are that concerned with your grades, act appropriately for your age.

Really, though, why not in-house suspension?? Kids would be responsible for getting their work done, there would be no cell phones, no TV, no internet, no DVD players AND at that level, you could give them EXTRA work to complete. I just don't see the problem here, other than paying someone to babysit these disobedient children.

Of course, ask me when my kids are teenagers and I might have another opinion!