School Survival

By Cory Doctorow According to the filings in Blake J Robbins v Lower Merion School District (PA) et al, the laptops issued to high-school students in the well-heeled Philly suburb have webcams that can be covertly activated by the schools' administrators, who have used this facility to spy on students and even their families. The […]

A 12-year-old Queens girl was hauled out of school in handcuffs for an artless offense - doodling her name on her desk in erasable marker, the Daily News has learned. Alexa Gonzalez was scribbling a few words on her desk Monday while waiting for her Spanish teacher to pass out homework at Junior High School […]

A federal appeals court today upheld frequent paddlings of a high school basketball player in Memphis by his coaches over missed practices, tardiness, poor grades, and even, allegedly, for missed shots during basketball games. Noting that Tennessee law permits corporal punishment by teachers "for good cause in order to maintain discipline and order within the […]

School officials can search students' cars on school property if they suspect the students of illegal activity, the state Supreme Court unanimously ruled yesterday in a decision that further broadens administrators' investigatory rights. Expanding the standard of "reasonable suspicion" to students' vehicles, the court said that "represents the best way to vindicate each student's right […]

An irate Staten Island mom blasted a grade school principal Wednesday for treating her son like a pint-sized Plaxico Burress after he brought a 2-inch-long toy gun to school. "This principal is a bully and a coward, and needs to be held accountable," said Laura Timoney, 44, after her teary fourth-grader was nearly suspended for […]

A ninth-grader was shot to death by another student during a class change Friday at a north Alabama middle school, authorities said. Todd Brown, 14, was shot about 1:45 p.m. and taken by ambulance from Discovery Middle School to Huntsville Hospital, where he died, said hospital spokeswoman Kristen Bishop. She wouldn't release any other details. […]

Students of Council Rock High School South have united to form South Students Against Literary and Cinematic Censorship in order to combat attempts by some parents to limit media use in the curriculum. Ryan Carlin founded the group after parents petitioned the school board to ban R-rated films in the classroom. Carlin accumulated more than […]

Culpeper County public school officials have decided to stop assigning a version of Anne Frank's diary, one of the most enduring symbols of the atrocities of the Nazi regime, after a parent complained that the book includes sexually explicit material and homosexual themes. "The Diary of a Young Girl: the Definitive Edition," which was published […]

He may be the president who governed during the Civil War, freeing the slaves, but under a new curriculum proposal for North Carolina high schools, U.S. history would begin years after President Lincoln, with the presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes in 1877. State education leaders say this may help students learn about more recent history […]

A Port St. Lucie first-grade student was handcuffed and committed to a mental health facility because of her classroom behavior, and her parents are furious that the school took such extreme measures. Mickey Shalansky explained Wednesday what he said happened to his 6-year-old daughter at Parkway Elementary. "She couldn't put her in two handcuffs because […]