School Survival

A charter school has fired one of its teachers -- accused of beating up a student on video. A classmate captured the entire incident on their cell phone. The teacher in question, identified by school officials as Sherri Davis, was officially terminated on Monday night. “Now that officials at Jamie’s House Charter School have been […]

by Laurie A. Couture I think it is a denial fantasy that the relentless verbal abuse that used to pound through the hallways of the Exeter Area Junior High in 1987 and 1988 have magically disappeared in 2010 at Cooperative Middle School. It's the same school, same hierarchical institution, same oppressive school rules, just in […]

A 14-year-old boy is believed to have voted in the general election in Lancashire. Police are investigating whether the boy filled in a ballot paper in the Wyre and Preston North Constituency. Wyre Borough Council said it believed an underage person had cast a vote on Thursday and the matter had been passed to the […]

A third-grader at Brazos Elementary was given a week’s detention for possessing a Jolly Rancher. School officials in western Fort Bend County are defending the seemingly harsh sentence. The school’s principal and superintendent said they were simply complying with a state law that limits junk food in schools. But the girl’s parents say it’s a […]

The ACLU is pushing Congress to outlaw corporal punishment in the United States. Although the practice has been banned throughout New England, it is currently legal to use physical punishment as a means of disciplining students in 20 states, primarily in the South. The House Education and Labor Subcommittee on Healthy Families and Communities held […]

A teacher with a phobia over rabbits is suing a 14-year-old pupil for compensation after she drew a bunny on the blackboard. The teacher, from Vechta, Germany, says she was traumatised by the drawing, and claims the girl knew it would terrify her. She had transferred to the school where a pupil from her former […]

It was a silent call to arms: an easy-to-overlook message urging New Jersey students to take a stand against the budget cuts that threaten class sizes and choices as well as after-school activities. But some 18,000 students accepted the invitation posted last month on Facebook, the social media site better known for publicizing parties and sporting events. And on Tuesday many of them — and many others — walked out of class in one of the largest grass-roots demonstrations to hit New Jersey in years.

New Jersey teens opposed to the nation's first state law requiring young drivers to display license plate decals that identify them as inexperienced have gained support for their cause from several state lawmakers and a national youth rights advocacy group. The statute known as Kyleigh's Law takes effect Saturday. It requires New Jersey drivers ages […]

I just received this on the National Youth Rights Association mailing list: NYRA has gotten involved in an ever escalating battle in New Jersey over Kyleigh's Law, a new law that goes into effect Saturday that will require provisional drivers under 21 to display a red sticker on their license plate identifying them as under […]

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to decide whether California may forbid the sale of violent video games to children. Lower courts have consistently struck down similar laws under the First Amendment, declining to extend obscenity principles to images of violence. The Supreme Court’s decision to hear the case in the absence of […]