Four high schoolers accused of tossing a bleach-filled balloon that hit a 14-year-old Gwinnett County boy in the face, seriously injuring him, told police they were only trying to ruin his clothes.

Lilburn police on Wednesday said the four Meadowcreek High students were responsible for the attack last week on Miguel Mesa, a student at Lilburn Middle School.

One was arrested and taken to a youth detention center, while the other three were expected to be in custody Wednesday night, police said.

Charges were pending against the four. Three are juveniles and one is an adult, but the adult’s name was not released.

Tips from the community led police to the suspects who threw the balloon from a van, said Lilburn Police Capt. Bruce Hedley.

“We’ve recovered the bleach bottle and balloons used,” Hedley told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

And that’s where you can find more of this story including a picture of the poor kid.

ORCHARD, Texas – A third-grader at Brazos Elementary was given a week’s detention for possessing a Jolly Rancher.
School officials in Brazos 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 huge overreaction.

“I think it’s stupid to give a kid a week’s worth of detention for a piece of candy,” said Amber Brazda, the girl’s mother. “The whole thing was just ridiculous to me.”

Leighann Adair, 10, was eating lunch Monday when a teacher confiscated the candy. Her parents said she was in tears when she arrived home later that afternoon and handed them the detention notice.

According to the disciplinary referral, she would be separated from other students during lunch and recess through Friday.
Jack Ellis, the superintendent for Brazos Independent School District, declined an on-camera interview. But he said the school was abiding by a state guideline that banned “minimal nutrition” foods.

“Whether or not I agree with the guidelines, we have to follow the rules,” he said.

The state, however, gives each school discretion over how to enforce the policy. Ellis said school officials had decided a stricter punishment was necessary after lesser penalties failed to serve as a deterrent.

Ellis said failing to adhere to the state’s guidelines could put federal funding in jeopardy.

According to the Texas Department of Agriculture’s website, “The Texas Public School Nutrition Policy (TPSNP) explicitly states that it does not restrict what foods or beverages parents may provide for their own children’s consumption.”

Brazos Elementary Principal Jeanne Young, said the problem, in this instance, was that the candy was provided by another student – not the girl’s parents.

The girl’s mother said the incident has taught her daughter a lesson, but not the one her teachers intended.

“I told her, ‘Leighann, unfortunately you’re learning very young that life’s not fair,’” Brazda said.

The seventh-grade girl at Cumming’s Liberty Middle School sent the nude photo of herself by cell phone to three boys at three middle schools in Forsyth County.

The 10th-grade boy at Forest Park High School sent the naked image of himself with his phone to a 16-year-old girl at his Clayton County school and it was forwarded to four other students, one of them 14.

The girl and boy were punished the same day last month in metro Atlanta school systems about 40 miles apart. Their consequences were quite different.

(more)

Maybe one day in the future we’ll figure out that our naked bodies aren’t inherently evil. And maybe one day legislatures will create laws that make functional and practical sense. And maybe one day monkeys will fly out of my butt. If so, I’ll make sure to take a pic of it and send it to you okay?

DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. — Five middle school students are facing criminal charges for attacking a DeKalb County student, police said.

A school district police report said the 12-year-old boy was held by several students, touched inappropriately, then stuffed in a locker.

It happened March 10 at Stephenson Middle School in Stone Mountain.

The 12-year-old victim said he went into the locker room to change clothes after track practice, and that’s when the group of six boys approached him, the report said.

Channel 2 Action News investigative reporter Jodie Fleischer spoke to parents about the incident. “This is something I had to talk to my son about because, he saw, and I’m trying to explain to him that’s something not supposed to happen at school and you’re not supposed to see this,” said Troy Ray.

Two 14-year-olds are facing sexual battery charges, three more students are facing reckless conduct charges and the sixth boy is not criminally charged, the report said. All students detained are facing school discipline.

“This was an incident, a situation that is intolerable, that’s not accepted by DeKalb County School system and we’re addressing it,” said district spokesman Dale Davis.

Davis also said this was an isolated incident and that the school environment in DeKalb is safe.

COCHRAN — Derrick Martin had a question he couldn’t answer, so he did what any 18-year-old would. Fingers tapping, he logged on to his computer last December and Googled the following words, which changed his life:

“I’m gay. Can I go to the prom?”

He can, and will. But those eight little words have done more than ensure the high school senior can take a same-sex date to Bleckley High School’s prom next month.

Seeking that answer has thrust him to the forefront of a national discussion. It’s touched off heated discussions in beauty salons and restaurants here and elsewhere, and made this small middle Georgia town a focal point in the debate over gay rights. Some applaud him for bravery. Others say his soul’s in peril.

All he really wanted, he says, was a night to remember.

“I didn’t anticipate this,” Derrick said earlier this week, a few days after news got out that he would bring his boyfriend, a young man from Tift County, to his prom. “I thought this might run on the second page of the paper.”

Instead, he’s Derrick Martin, sudden celebrity. As he sat on a bench underneath a bare oak tree outside a Bleckley school building, a Ford pickup, kids hanging out of its cab, zipped by. Derrick! Derrick! young voices belled.

A Honda sped past. It sprouted arms from every window. Hey, Derrick!

Derrick sighed. “If I could have just brought him without asking, I would have done that.”

‘You better sit down’

Derrick Martin is young enough that his facial hair is still spotty; like the rest of him, it’s not done growing. His 160 pounds are stretched across a frame nudging 6-foot-3. He is as long and narrow as a church pew, and only slightly more comfortable discussing all that’s happened since his Google query.

As he searched Web sites, Derrick came across the legal defense site for the national gay-rights organization Lambda. A representative of the group told him that if a school system didn’t have rules forbidding same-sex dates, then Derrick likely could bring his boyfriend.

“They did warn me that the school system could cancel the prom,” he said.

That wasn’t just conjecture. School officials in Itawamba County, Miss., canceled a prom recently after 18-year-old Constance McMillen said she wanted to bring a girl to her school’s April 2 dance. The American Civil Liberties Union, claiming the school board violated her right to free expression, has demanded that McMillen be allowed to attend.

Nothing like that occurred in January, when Derrick requested a meeting with Bleckley High Principal Michelle Masters. Because his date isn’t a Bleckley student, school rules required Derrick to fill out a form identifying him. He decided to check with Masters first.

“You better sit down,” he began.

Masters took the request to the Bleckley County Board of Education. When the board next met, it also discussed another Martin — Derrick’s father, Ray, a math teacher at the high school. Board members named him Bleckley’s teacher of the year.

Then they turned to his son. In early March, the board announced that Derrick could bring his boyfriend to the prom. School Superintendent Charlotte Pipkin, who declined comment, earlier this week released a two-paragraph statement.

The board decision, the statement said in part, “is not an endorsement of any particular practice or life style, but rather recognition of the legal environment in which public schools operate today.”

Bleckley High School, home of the Royals, would hold its prom April 17, as originally planned. The junior class would plan it, as well as decorate the school gym. This is a BHS tradition.

But tradition, people soon learned, was about to get a test.

A town debates

Cochran, about two hours south of Atlanta, is a confluence of U.S. and state roads that come together for a few blocks before fanning out again across rolling land that yields peanuts and cotton. A museum near the police department is dedicated to those agricultural staples.

About 5,200 people live here. Wednesdays at noon, much of downtown adheres to a practice that has just about gone the way of the mule. Stores close. People head to the municipal golf course, visit Macon to shop, or catch up on the latest events.

A lot of catching up these days focuses on Derrick’s decision, and how it reflects change — not just in Cochran, either.

Barbara Anderson’s shears snipped quickly, as if they were as indignant as she.

“I think they [the school board] ought to do like that other state and cancel the prom,” said Anderson, who owns a styling salon here. “They won’t allow us to have God in school, but they’ll allow this?”

Across the street, waitress Victoria Cagle took a break after the lunch rush. She is a 2009 Bleckley grad who hopes to attend nearby Middle Georgia College and teach high school biology.

“I think what they [the board] did was the right thing,” said Cagle, 19. “I think what he’s doing is awesome.”

Merchant Jason Ledbetter isn’t so sure.

“It bothers me,” said Ledbetter, 47, part-owner of a downtown music store. “By him doing that, it shows we accept it.”

Business partner Kenny Laney wasn’t as ruffled as Ledbetter. “It’s like an inter-racial couple,” said Laney, 54. “I thought we would have gotten over that by now, and gotten over this, too.”

The boys may face a divine reckoning, said resident Faye Ortiz. “What they do is up to them,” said Ortiz, 45, who recently moved back to central Georgia from Texas. “They’ve got to answer to God.”

Dealing with fallout

Opinions aside, Derrick’s action has come at a cost. He’s no longer living at home. Staying there, he said, became intolerable as news spread that he was taking his boyfriend to the prom. For now he’s staying with a friend, the girl he escorted to last year’s prom.

“She’s my best friend,” he said.

He also has friends who are gay, Derrick said. He expected some of them to stand with him when he took his request to school officials.

“I thought I would have had a little bit of backup,” he said, disappointment creeping in his voice. “But it’s just me.”

His boyfriend, who’s also 18 and a school senior, has not made any public comments. Derrick’s parents are remaining silent, too.

So Derrick talks. He talks about school. Kids there have known he is gay for a while. Most of them, he thinks, are on his side.

He talks about work. He is an after-school tutor for elementary and middle school kids at risk of not passing state tests.

He talks about the future. He’s planning to attend Georgia Southern University, which he said has given him a scholarship in recognition of his 92.5 average. He wants to go to law school, maybe someday become the state or U.S. attorney general. “That would just be so awesome.”

He also thinks about what has happened these past few months.

“I only wanted to be honest,” he said. Now, he feels an obligation. If he has to be the face of gay rights, OK.

A big lesson to learn from eight little words.

Not only do we have the kissy-kissy picture I posted yesterday causing the stir, you can add to that the following.

Prom in Mississippi school called off when it was found out a lesbian was going to bring her girlfriend.

Virginia politicians first undo then kind of half-assedly redo protections against gay discrimination.

Florida legislators are pondering using tax breaks as a way to mold family-values, making sure to try and exclude gay stuff.

And of course, homophobia abounds in the fall out over the Eric Massa shit.

That’s just a couple days worth of news that I uncovered during my regular looking over things on the interbutts. I didn’t even include things that are happening in other parts of the world.

So what’s the deal? Is it because we got pussy-acting Democrats in control over both houses of Congress and the Presidency that now the other side is all revved up and ready to trample over basic human rights? Because, let me tell you something, if the Bush Years made everyone so goth damned depressed… I have to suggest that maybe we homos should feel even more goth damned depressed now.

Dictionaries have been removed from classrooms in southern California schools after a parent complained about a child reading the definition for “oral sex”.

Merriam Webster’s 10th edition, which has been used for the past few years in fourth and fifth grade classrooms (for children aged nine to 10) in Menifee Union school district, has been pulled from shelves over fears that the “sexually graphic” entry is “just not age appropriate”, according to the area’s local paper.

The dictionary’s online definition of the term is “oral stimulation of the genitals”. “It’s hard to sit and read the dictionary, but we’ll be looking to find other things of a graphic nature,” district spokeswoman Betti Cadmus told the paper.

While some parents have praised the move – “[it's] a prestigious dictionary that’s used in the Riverside County spelling bee, but I also imagine there are words in there of concern,” said Randy Freeman – others have raised concerns. “It is not such a bad thing for a kid to have the wherewithal to go and look up a word he may have even heard on the playground,” father Jason Rogers told local press. “You have to draw the line somewhere. What are they going to do next, pull encyclopaedias because they list parts of the human anatomy like the penis and vagina?”

A panel is now reviewing whether the Menifee ban will be made permanent. The Merriam Webster dictionary joins an illustrious set of books that have been banned or challenged in the US, including Nobel prize winner Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon, which last year was suspended from and then reinstated to the curriculum at a Michigan school after complaints from parents about its coverage of graphic sex and violence, and titles by Khaled Hosseini and Philip Pullman, included in the American Library Association’s list of books that inspired most complaints last year.

As punishment for bad grades, a Georgia mother forced her 12-year-old son to kill his pet hamster with a hammer, police said.

The day after he was forced to kill his pet, the child told his teacher, Meriwether County Sheriff Steve Whitlock told the AJC Thursday evening.

The teacher reported the incident to DFCS authorities, who contacted police, Whitlock said. The pet’s death allegedly took place at the family’s Warm Springs home.

On Friday, 38-year-old Lynn Middlebrooks Geter was arrested, Whitlock said. Geter faces one charge each of animal cruelty, child cruelty and battery.

Geter remained in the Meriwether County jail Thursday evening, Whitlock said.

SELMA, Ind. — Police say a fifth-grader handed out about $300 to others on the bus ride to his eastern Indiana school. Problem is, they say, the cash was among some $10,000 he took from his grandparents’ safe.

Delaware County Sheriff George Sheridan says the boy was riding the bus to Selma Elementary School when he handed out the money on Friday, the last school day before Christmas vacation began.

Children who received the ones, fives and twenties told teachers and the principal, and the sheriff’s department was called.

Officers found the boy carrying the rest of the cash, which was returned to his grandparents. Police weren’t certain what he intended to do with the money or how he got it from the safe.

The Cobb County district attorney plans to move forward with the prosecution of a teacher who had sex with a 17-year-old student, even though a judge last week found that a similar romance was “gross” and “awful” but not illegal.

Cobb County Superior Court Judge Robert Flournoy ruled Dec. 9 that former Marietta High School teacher Christopher King was not guilty of sexual assault charges stemming from a relationship with a 17-year-old female student.

The judge’s decision echoed a Georgia Supreme Court ruling in June that stated it is not illegal for a teacher and a student who is 16 or older to have sex. The age of consent in Georgia is 16.

Cobb County District Attorney Pat Head said he disagrees with Flournoy’s ruling. He plans to move forward with the case against Steven Martin Parkman, a former teacher at Harrison High School in west Cobb.

Parkman, 34, is accused of having consensual sex with a 17-year-old female student.

“The judge and I differ on our opinion about whether expert testimony regarding consent is a factual issue for the jury or not,” Head said in an e-mail. “Obviously, I think it is and he does not.”

Head said he will ask a grand jury to reindict Parkman within the next few weeks and add a charge of sodomy against the former orchestra teacher. Parkman resigned in lieu of termination before his arrest April 14, 2008.

Parkman’s lawyer, Noah Pines, said the continued prosecution of his client is “ridiculous.”

Letters, texts and Facebook posts indicate that the alleged victim willingly had sex with Parkman, Pines said.

Pines said he will file a motion to dismiss the sodomy charge on the grounds that it is unconstitutional if his client is reindicted. The state law prohibiting sodomy, which is defined as either oral or anal sex, is seldom enforced when it involves consenting adults.

Sodomy is a felony punishable by one to 20 years in prison and a lifetime on the sex offender registry. The punishment is much harsher for a couple caught engaging in oral sex than it is for a couple caught having intercourse in public. Public indecency is a misdemeanor punishable by a maximum of 12 months in prison and a $1,000 fine.

Parkman told investigators that he had sex with the student in the orchestra room at school and in his car. The student has since graduated from high school and entered college, Pines said.

“If they present the case on sodomy, they are selectively prosecuting my client,” Pines said. “The law applies to anyone who gives or receives [oral sex]. She is just as guilty as my client.”

The War On Kids: Official Site
Interview with Stephen Colbert

Schools have become prisons. In fact, they are designed by the same architects.
Natural child-like behavior has become criminalized.
Zero Tolerance has replaced common sense.
There is a war on kids, and now there is a documentary about just that.

CALABASAS, Calif. (AP) – Three boys have been arrested for investigation of bullying red-haired students after a Facebook message promoted “Kick a Ginger Day” at a Southern California school.

Los Angeles County sheriff’s spokesman Steve Whitmore said Monday that two 12-year-olds were arrested for suspicion of misdemeanor battery, and a 13-year-old was booked for misdemeanor cyberbullying. They were released to their parents.

A total of eight boys are suspected in the Nov. 20 attacks on seven students at A.E. Wright Middle School in Calabasas.

Authorities believe the shoves and kicks were prompted by a message referring to a “South Park” episode satirizing racial prejudice.

Nobody was seriously hurt.

(Ed note: lol, cyberbullying is a crime now? Oh shit. Guess I should take back all those mean things I said about others in all of those archive posts.)

Young men of Morehouse, pull up your pants, remove your do-rags and remove your shades and hats when you enter a building.

Thanks to a new policy on the campus of Morehouse College, they are no longer permissible.

The new policy is an effort to “get back to the legacy” of Morehouse leaders, said Dr. William Bynum, vice president of the Office of Student Services.

“We expect our young men to be Renaissance men,” said Bynum. “When people go about campus we want them to represent the college in an appropriate manner.”

The policy details 11 expectations of students, including:

* no caps, do-rags and/or hoods in classrooms, the cafeteria, or other indoor venues

* no sun glasses worn in class or at formal programs

* no jeans at major programs, as well as no sagging pants on campus

* no clothing with derogatory or lewd messages either in words or pictures

* no wearing of clothing usually worn by women (dresses, tops, tunics, purses, pumps, etc.) on the Morehouse campus or at college-sponsored events.

Students that violate the new rules risk academic suspension.

Bynum said most students are supportive of the policy.

Cameron Thomas-Shah, the student government co-chief of staff, is one of them. While working as a resident’s assistant (RA) he said he noticed freshmen dressed in a way that was unflattering to Morehouse.

“The image of a strong black man needs to be upheld,” he said. “And if anyone sees this policy as something that is restrictive then maybe Morehouse is not the place for you.”

Daniel Edwards, co-president of Safe Space, a gay straight alliance student campus organization said he has heard from students that are for and against the policy, but he believes it is discriminatory.

It is the restriction to women’s clothing that has many students up in arms.

“Some believe that this restriction is what the entire policy is correlated around,” added Edwards. “It is all an issue of perception and what manner of image you want to prescribe to.”

But the new policy is not meant to be discriminatory, said Bynum.

“This is necessary, this is needed according to the students,” he said. “We know the challenges that young African-American men face. We know that how a student dresses has nothing to do with what is in their head, but first impressions mean everything.”

Morehouse is not the only college to enforce a dress policy.

Hampton University also has a dress code, including within its business school where students with braids or dreadlocks are encouraged to cut their hair. And Bennett College, in Greensboro, N.C., has enforced a policy similar to Morehouse’s.

LONDON — Britain’s National Health Service has a message for teens: Sex can be fun.

Health officials are trying to change the tone of sex education by urging teachers to emphasize that sexual relations can be healthy and pleasurable instead of simply explaining the mechanics of sex and warning about diseases.

The new pamphlet, called “Pleasure,” has sparked some opposition from those who believe it encourages promiscuity among teens in a country that already has high rates of teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.

The National Health Service in the city of Sheffield produced the booklet, which has a section called “an orgasm a day” that encourages educators to tell teens about the positive physical and emotional effects of sex and masturbation, which is described as an easy way for people to explore their bodies and feel good. Like more traditional sex education guides, it encourages demonstrations about how to use condoms and other contraceptives.

Some professionals have hailed the new approach as a welcome antidote to traditional sex education, which they say can be long on biological facts but short on information about the complexity of human relationships.

The booklet suggests ways in which teachers can encourage sexual awareness and responsibility while teaching young people that sex is something that is meant to be enjoyed.

Steve Slack, who helped produce the leaflet as Director of the Center for HIV&Sexual Health in Sheffield, said one goal is to help young people learn to resist peer pressure and delay having sex until they are emotionally ready.

“Far from promoting teenage sex, it is designed to encourage young people to delay losing their virginity until they are sure they will enjoy the experience,” he said.

Slack said some of the ideas in the booklet came from the Netherlands, which is well known in Europe for its liberal attitude toward sexual behavior.

But the pamphlet is condemned by some educators who believe it will lead to more casual sex among teens.

“Some of it is good sense, but I think it’s wrong is to suggest that 16-year-olds should wantonly enter into having sexual intercourse for pleasure,” said Anthony Seldon, headmaster of Wellington College, a school for teens.”I think this is medically wrong and emotionally wrong and will increase teenage pregnancy and impact negatively on the formation of a long-term loving relationship.”

He said teens should be taught about the value of a long-term commitment, not simply about the pleasures of sexual intercourse.

Ruth Smith, news editor of Children&Young People Now magazine, said one goal of the new booklet is to help young people become more comfortable with their sexuality and to let them know they can speak out if they are abused or forced into a situation they don’t like.

“Research shows young people feel pressured to have sex before they’re ready,” she said.”This booklet is intended to give them the skills to discuss it. It’s not a license to go out and have sex, it’s saying if you do, do it, wait until you’re ready and enjoy it. It makes them more confident and more able to say no.”

She said the instruction guide will not be given to students but is intended to suggest ways in which teachers can start a conversation about sex.

“It’s trying to find what works with young people,” she said.

ELK GROVE, Calif.—A Northern California elementary school teacher who set out to capture class memories on DVD, ended up adding six seconds of her having sex on the couch.

Officials at the Elk Grove Unified School District asked families of the teacher’s 24 students to get rid of the DVD after the unintended clip was found spliced in a scene where children were sharing stories in class.

“Just destroy them,” said spokeswoman Torrey Johnson.

Johnson said the teacher, whose name isn’t being released, sent the DVD home with her students from Isabelle Jackson Elementary on the last day of class Friday. She learned of the mistake after a parent called her over the weekend. She then called all the parents to ask them to destroy the DVD.

The school district, located just south of Sacramento, sent a letter home to parents asking them to return the DVDs. Since then, they have asked parents to simply destroy them.

Johnson said the district is investigating whether any criminal activity was involved.

Sgt. Tim Curran, a spokesman for the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department, said the DVD incident “may not be prosecutable” because authorities would have to show the teacher intended to distribute the material.

LOS ANGELES — An openly gay teen has been voted prom queen at his Los Angeles high school in a campaign that began as a stunt but ended up spurring discussion on the campus about gender roles and popularity.

Sergio Garcia said he felt “invincible” when he was crowned queen of the Fairfax High School dance at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel on Saturday.

Days before the dance, Garcia told fellow students that he was “not your typical prom queen candidate. There’s more to me than meets the eye.”

He also promised that he would be wearing a suit on prom night, but “don’t be fooled: Deep down, I am a queen.”

And he made good of that promise Saturday, wearing a gray tuxedo topped off with the prized tiara.

Garcia, 18, said he saw fliers advertising the prom and the election but they didn’t specify that the queen must be female. He thought the role would suit him better than prom king.

“I don’t wish to be a girl,” he told the Los Angeles Times. “I just wish to be myself.”

Senior class president Vanessa Lo said she and other students were initially against the idea but became convinced he wasn’t just an attention-seeking clown.

“It just goes to show how open-minded our class is,” Lo said.

Unique Payne, 17, said she voted for Garcia because she supported the gay community.

Although many students were supportive of Garcia’s run, others were upset and didn’t understand why Garcia chose to run for prom queen.

“I’m not really happy about that,” said 17-year-old Juan Espinoza. “He should’ve run for prom king.”

Thunder Bay, Canada: A Thunder Bay woman is demanding an explanation after a teacher’s aide at her son’s school cut his long hair — an action her lawyer says is clearly assault while the Crown insists there are no grounds for charges.

CBC News is not naming the family to protect the child’s identity.

The seven-year-old boy had chin-length hair before the incident last month. His mother said staff at McKellar Park Central Public School were aware her son was letting his hair grow so that he could take part in traditional First Nations dancing.

The mother told CBC News she was stunned when her son told her it was a teacher’s assistant who lopped off 10 centimetres of his hair.

“I said, ‘Why did she do this? Did she say anything?’” said the mother. “And he said, ‘No, and after she cut my hair, she took me by the shoulders and forced me to stand in front of the mirror. She made me stand there and said look at you now.’”

Lawyer Julian Falconer is representing the family.

“We have a classic example of the vulnerabilities of a seven-year-old being taken advantage [of] by someone with a pair of scissors who lifted that child on a stool and proceeded to violate the child,” Falconer said. “The question becomes how could the police and the Crown attorney’s office turn a blind eye to this?”

Thunder Bay police took head shots of the child as part of their investigation of the incident and also interviewed the school principal, the teacher’s assistant involved and the mother and boy, said police spokesman Chris Adams.

“The Crown got back to us and indicated that there were no grounds for criminal charges, and it wasn’t in the public interest according to the Crown,” he said.

A spokesperson for Lakehead Public School Board confirmed the “unfortunate incident” took place but declined to comment further.

The teaching assistant has been suspended, but the mother said that does not go far enough.

FINDLAY, Ohio — A student at a fundamentalist Baptist school that forbids dancing, rock music, hand-holding and kissing will be suspended if he takes his girlfriend to her public high school prom, his principal said.

Despite the warning, 17-year-old Tyler Frost, who has never been to a dance before, said he plans to attend Findlay High School’s prom Saturday.

Frost, a senior at Heritage Christian School in northwest Ohio, agreed to the school’s rules when he signed a statement of cooperation at the beginning of the year, principal Tim England said.

The teen, who is scheduled to receive his diploma May 24, would be suspended from classes and receive an “incomplete” on remaining assignments, England said. Frost also would not be permitted to attend graduation but would get a diploma once he completes final exams. If Frost is involved with alcohol or sex at the prom, he will be expelled, England said.

Frost’s stepfather Stephan Johnson said the school’s rules should not apply outside the classroom.

“He deserves to wear that cap and gown,” Johnson said.

Frost said he thought he had handled the situation properly. Findlay requires students from other schools attending the prom to get a signature from their principal, which Frost did.

“I expected a short lecture about making the right decisions and not doing something stupid,” Frost said. “I thought I would get his signature and that would be the end.”

England acknowledged signing the form but warned Frost there would be consequences if he attended the dance. England then took the issue to a school committee made up of church members, who decided to threaten Frost with suspension.

“In life, we constantly make decisions whether we are going to please self or please God. (Frost) chose one path, and the school committee chose the other,” England said.

The handbook for the 84-student Christian school says rock music “is part of the counterculture which seeks to implant seeds of rebellion in young people’s hearts and minds.”

England said Frost’s family should not be surprised by the school’s position.

“For the parents to claim any injustice regarding this issue is at best forgetful and at worst disingenuous,” he said. “It is our hope that the student and his parents will abide by the policies they have already agreed to.”

The principal at Findlay High School, whose graduates include Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, said he respects, but does not agree with, Heritage Christian School’s view of prom.

“I don’t see (dancing and rock music) as immoral acts,” Craig Kupferberg said.

(Ed note: “Freakshow” may be a little more far fetched, but “Later, Skater” is probably dead on truth.)

State health officials have confirmed a case of swine flu involving a 14-year-old student at Eagles Landing Christian Academy in McDonough.

The private Henry County school is now closed for the next 14 days, officials said.

Elizabeth Ford, director of the state Division of Public Health, also revealed more information on three additional probable cases of swine flu: A 36-year-old pregnant woman from DeKalb County; an 8-year-old girl from Clayton County; and a 3-year-old boy from Cobb County.

Ford said the testing indicates there is a high likelihood that the three probable cases also will be confirmed as swine flu by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Ford said the 14-year-old at Eagle’s Landing may have obtained the illness from a younger sibling who had flu-like symptoms during the school spring break. That 12-year-old sibling is now well.

Eagle’s Landing is about 25 miles south of Atlanta. According to the school’s Website, it has an enrollment of over 1,100 on its 86-acre campus.

On Monday, 16-year-old Matthew Calhoun recalled how anytime classmates coughed last week, they were ribbed for possibly having the H1N1 virus, commonly called swine flu.

But last Friday during a prayer request at the private Christian school, another student asked that they pray for a sick middle-schooler suspected of having the virus.

“Then I just wanted to go home,” he said.

On Sunday, Matthew received a text from his best friend that school was canceled because of suspected swine flu. Moments later, officials from the school in Henry County phoned his father, Dwayne Calhoun, and said school was canceled indefinitely as authorities tried to determine whether the unnamed student had contracted swine flu.

The H1N1 virus has sickened more than 200 people and killed one in the U.S., according to statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention .

Dwayne Calhoun, whose 6-year-old son also attends Eagle’s Landing, said he was impressed with the school’s handling of the case.

“I’m thankful they are taking the precautions they are,” he said. “They keep the parents pretty well informed.”

Calhoun said his family isn’t alarmed by the news and is taking basic precautions of frequent hand-washing. Matthew said he and his friends are a bit shaken by the news.

“At first there was only one case in Georgia, and then the odds of the second case [possibly] being in our school is pretty wild,” he said.

In the first case, a woman visiting Georgia from Kentucky was sent on to the CDC for final testing, and it tested positive for swine flu. She remains in a hospital in stable condition in LaGrange.

Matthew and his friends do not know the student in question.

On its web site Monday, Eagle’s Landing President Tim Dowdy said the school is undergoing a deep cleaning as a precaution.

Cowdy added that the health department will be contacting any student who may have been exposed to the virus.

(Ed note: Oh lawd! Shota’s got swine flu in my area!)

* Students in NYC come down with sudden flu-like symptoms, 8 confirmed Swine Flu. In total 5 states in the US have confirmed cases. California, Kansas, Ohio, Texas, and New York.

* Mexico City grinds to standstill as residents stay home.

* Cases are also confirmed in Canada, suspected in New Zealand, Israel, Spain.

* US Government releases some of its stockpiles of Tamiflu and Relenza to combat possible pandemic.

* CDC recommend planning for school closures.

(more)

PRESCOTT, Ariz. (AP) – A youthful-looking sex offender who posed as a 12-year-old boy to enroll in several Arizona schools was sentenced to more than 70 1/2 years in prison Tuesday.

Neil Havens Rodreick II pleaded guilty last year to seven criminal charges. Most involved child pornography but two stemmed from the charade he pulled off for two years.

Rodreick, 31, didn’t speak at his sentencing, shaking his head ‘no’ when Yavapai County Superior Court Judge Thomas Lindberg asked if he had anything to say.

Lindberg told Rodreick that he found his conduct deceitful and appalling and said he should have received an even longer sentence.

Rodreick attended schools in Surprise, Payson and Prescott Valley starting in 2005.

Authorities said he shaved and wore makeup to help him appear younger, convincing teachers, students and administrators that he was a boy named Casey.

He was caught in January 2007 after spending a day in the seventh grade at a Chino Valley school when school officials became suspicious because his birth certificate and other documents looked forged. They had initially thought they might be dealing with a child who had been abducted.

Authorities didn’t find any victims of sexual abuse at the schools Rodreick attended, but they found an extensive collection of child pornography at his home.

Rodreick originally faced 28 counts, but pleaded guilty to only a quarter of them: four counts of sexual exploitation of a minor stemming from the pornography, and one count each of failure to register as a sex offender, fraud and simple assault. The assault charge involved an allegation that he grabbed a girl’s buttocks at a school in Prescott Valley with the intent to injure, insult or provoke.

Rodreick was arrested with Brian J. Nellis, 36, who was posing as his cousin, and two older men posing as their uncle and grandfather.

Nellis, Lonnie Eugene Stiffler, 63, and Robert James Snow, 46, were indicted on various charges, including child pornography and forgery. Nellis and Snow, both convicted sex offenders, were also charged with failing to register with authorities.

Stiffler was sentenced Tuesday to 14 years in prison, and Snow received 22 years. Nellis was sentenced last month to 51 years in prison with no chance of parole.

Before coming to Arizona, Rodreick was convicted in Oklahoma of lewdly propositioning a 6-year-old boy in 1996. He served about six years in prison.

(Ed note: *snicker*)

A Connecticut middle school principal has laid down the law: You put your hands on someone — anyone — in any way, you’re going to pay.

A violent incident that put one student in the hospital has officials at the Milford school implementing a “no touching” policy, according to a letter written by the school’s principal.

East Shore Middle School parents said the change came after a student was sent to the hospital after being struck in the groin.

Principal Catherine Williams sent out a letter earlier in the week telling parents recent behavior has seriously impacted the safety and learning at the school.

“Observed behaviors of concern recently exhibited include kicking others in the groin area, grabbing and touching of others in personal areas, hugging and horseplay. Physical contact is prohibited to keep all students safe in the learning environment,” Williams wrote.

Students and parents are outraged. They said the new policy means no high-fives and hugs, as well as horseplay of any kind. The consequences could be dire, Williams warned in the letter.

“Potential consequences and disciplinary action may include parent conferences, detention, suspension and/or a request for expulsion from school,” Williams wrote.

Many think the school’s no tolerance policy goes way too far. Others said it’s utterly ridiculous.

“Now it’s almost as if it’s a sanitized school. Where you have to keep your distance from everybody? And that’s not what school is about,” one father said.

“What if they are out on the playground at recess, or in gym class?” parent Kathy Casey wondered. “You know, gym class is physical.”

Children 17 and younger cannot hang out in public places between 8:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. on school days, according to a new city ordinance.

There are exceptions for children going to or from school, participating in school activities, or those who have written consent from a legal guardian. Home schooled children also are exempted from the curfew.

The state of Georgia has a nightime curfew for children 17 and under, but there is no statewide curfew for school hours. Minors must be in by 11 p.m. on weekdays and by midnight on weekends.

Kennesaw passed the ordinance Monday to support the schools, said Mayor Mark Mathews.

For years, the Cobb County school system has increased efforts to reduce truancy.

When students are frequently absent, it’s Paul Pursell’s job to figure out why. As the truancy court coordinator for Cobb schools, Pursell works with school social workers to get them back in school.

“Truancy is a predictor of delinquent behavior,” Pursell said. “If your child is truant, they may be doing something you don’t know about.”

School social worker Steve Fletcher splits his time among three Kennesaw schools. He believes the new law will help.

“I routinely see students I know wandering around the streets,” Fletcher said. “I just don’t have the authority, legally, to stop a child and confront them and try to get them back in school.”

Powder Springs passed a similar ordinance in 2006. Parents also can be cited. The first offense brings a warning, and subsequent offenses include fines up to $1,000.

In February, Pursell said he presented Mathews with a plan for a daytime curfew. He said he hopes other cities and the county will consider daytime curfews.

(Ed note: Because that’s what we really need: more laws like this. How about working harder on making schools something where kids want to attend and graduate rather than skip and drop out?)

Two Bountiful Junior High School teachers are accused of sexually assaulting the same 13-year-old student, after their separate relationships with him spiraled from personal conversations to the exchange of sexual text messages and phone sex, authorities said.

On Friday, the Davis County Attorney’s Office filed first-degree felony charges of rape and sodomy on a child against Linda R. Nef, 46, and Valynne Bowers, 39.

Nef, a Utah studies teacher and cheerleading adviser, and Bowers, who teaches math, each confessed to having sex with the student, said Bountiful Police Lt. Randy Pickett. Until recently, the two teachers did not know about each other’s relationship with the same boy, Pickett said.

The charges were filed after Nef arranged a meeting with police on Thursday and admitted having sex with the boy for more than a year, Pickett said. Their sexual relationship allegedly began in October 2007 and lasted until December 2008, he said.

During the meeting, Nef revealed Bowers’ relationship with the boy, Pickett said. Bowers allegedly began having sex with him in December, and she also has acknowledged the relationship, he said.

Nef was booked into the Davis County Jail on Friday afternoon and has her first court appearance scheduled for 1:30 p.m. March 27.

Bowers also was arrested and booked into the jail on Friday, Pickett said. She later appeared in court, where she waived her right to a preliminary hearing and was ordered to stand trial. A felony arraignment in her case is scheduled for 9 a.m. March 16.

Nef, who began her career with the Davis County School District in 2004 as a physical education teacher at Taylor Elementary School, resigned from her post at the junior high on Monday, said school district spokesman Chris Williams.

Bowers was placed on administrative leave while district officials conduct their own investigation. Bowers has taught in the district since 1996 and was an elementary school teacher for nine years before she transferred to Bountiful Junior High in 2006, Williams said.

“So far, there is nothing to indicate that there are any other students involved, or any other faculty or employees involved,” Pickett said.

In separate conversations, the boy and the two teachers began discussing personal problems, Pickett said. That led to text messages, including ones involving sexual matters, then phone sex and the alleged sexual assaults, Pickett said.

The investigation so far indicates none of the alleged sex acts occurred at the school, Pickett said. Instead, the teachers allegedly went with the student to homes, parking lots or parks in Bountiful, Woods Cross, Farmington and Kaysville.

Williams said parents picking up their children from the school Friday expressed disbelief and shock. Jenifer Wright, whose eighth-grade daughter attends the school, said the news alarmed her.

“It makes me very worried. I’m very protective about my children,” she said.

Holly Ruhr, whose seventh-grade daughter attends the school, said she is not worried by the charges because she has been “impressed in every way” by Bountiful Junior High.

“My daughter is thrilled to go to class every day,” she said. “This is just a case of one or two teachers. Not a bad school.”

Another parent struggled to believe the allegations, defending Bowers as a great teacher.

Teenagers spend an average of 31 hours a week online and nearly two hours a week looking at pornography, according to a study.

They spend some three and a half hours communicating with friends on MSN, and around two hours on YouTube and in chat rooms.

Just over an hour is devoted to looking up cosmetic surgery procedures such as how to enlarge breasts and get collagen implants, an hour and a half is spent on family planning and pregnancy websites and one hour 35 minutes is spent investigating diets and weight loss.

One in four teenagers of the 1,000 polled said they regularly spoke to strangers online but thought it harmless.

One in three admitted trying to hide what they were looking at if a parent entered the room.

But children also use the internet to help them with homework, with at least three hours a week spent searching for such information.

The research was conducted by cybersentinel which provides software solutions allowing parents to block access to certain sites.

Spokesman Ellie Puddle said: “The alarming thing is the survey shows teenagers are obviously exploring all sorts of topics as a result of modern-day pressures.

“Talking to friends on social networking websites can be completely risk-free, good fun. But there is also the danger of online predators.

“Teenagers and parents need to realise the dangers of talking to strangers online but parents must not overreact by denying access to the internet. The internet is a fantastic resource for learning and development.”

(Ed note: Of course, these dangerous wouldn’t be so frightening if parents were more open to communicating with their kids and less upset when schools attempt to discuss such.)

Reports suggest a new craze is sweeping high schools and universities, with girl students embarking on an unusual hunt for young boys, in order to see who can have sex with the youngest.

The competitions, said by local newspapers in Thailand’s Phitsanulok province to be spreading through the educational establishments of the region, are to secure the youngest male in a sexual encounter, and of course to provide proof of it.

Thus schoolgirls and students are said to be filming their trysts with the boys; a witness to the trend even claims that two boys who had been used so actually had the films and were sharing them amongst their own friends.

We do not hear what their victims actually think of their sporting encounters, although delight seems the most probable reaction, especially going by the rather optimistic photographs reproduced here.

Needville, Texas (South of Houston) — Five-year-old Adriel Arocha doesn’t have to stuff his hair into his shirt collar. And he doesn’t have to meet privately with a teacher, away from his classmates, for flouting the school’s policy on hair length.

On Tuesday, a federal judge ruled that the Needville Independent School District’s policy violated state law and the U.S. Constitution by punishing the American Indian kindergartner for religious beliefs that require him to wear his hair long.

“By the policy’s terms, A.A. must wear his hair in his shirt during recess, on field trips, and on the school bus. When he becomes older, he will have to wear his hair down the back of his shirt at football games, school dances, and, presumably, his high school graduation,” wrote U.S. District Judge Keith P. Ellison. “The policy will deny A.A. the opportunity to express a religious practice that is very dear to him and his father.”

Adriel’s father, Kenney Arocha, who is part Apache Indian, says that he considers his hair sacred — not to be cut except during major life events, such as the death of a loved one.

It’s been 11 years since Arocha has cut his hair. His son’s hair has never been cut, and is now about 13 inches long.

Needville’s policy does not permit long hair for boys, so Adriel’s parents applied for a religious exemption before the school year started. Administrators told him he would have to wear his hair in one long braid, tucked into the back of his shirt at all times.

When he came to school with two braids hanging outside his shirt, they made him attend classes in isolation from the other students.

The ACLU picked up the case, and in October, a judge granted a temporary injunction that allowed Adriel to go back to his regular classes.

Ellison’s Tuesday order makes that injunction permanent.

Needville’s superintendent, Curtis Rhodes, was not available for comment Wednesday evening.

ACLU spokeswoman Dotty Griffith said the family harbored no grudge against the school district, and that Adriel was thriving there.

“Children are very resilient and very forward-looking, and that’s the way this boy has been,” Griffith said. “Now that it’s resolved, life goes on.”

This is an update to this story.

A six-year-old who recently stole his parents’ car and drove it into a utility pole has passed the buck onto a familiar scapegoat: the video game, Grand Theft Auto.

Rockstar Games’ controversial Grand Theft Auto video game series has been accused of many things in the past. Its violent gameplay, including car heists, bank heists, beatings, shootings, and absentee law enforcement, has been criticized by parent groups and crusaders (or in the eyes of gamers, nincompoops) like former lawyer Jack Thompson for years (Thompson once tried to link the Virginia Tech slayings to late-night Counterstrike sessions. He’s since been disbarred). However, not as of yet has anyone under the age of, oh, ten, blamed the game for a car theft.

Perhaps that should be clarified. The six-year-old Virginia tyke didn’t actually blame Grand Theft Auto for the car heist, but did tell authorities afterwards that the game taught him how to drive. Early Monday morning, the little guy hopped into his parents’ Ford Taurus instead of taking the big yellow bus, and managed to drive it a surprising six miles before slipping over an embankment into a utility pole not far from school. According to reports, he passed several cars, made a pair of ninety-degree turns, and generally drove just as people do in the game.

Thankfully, the boy emerged from the incident with just a few scratches and actually resumed his journey to school on foot after the accident took place.

(Ed note: Yeah, um, as liberal as I am, I don’t think 6 year old’s should be playing Grand Theft Auto.)

WICOMICO CHURCH, Va. — A 6-year-old Virginia boy who missed his bus tried to drive to school in his family’s sedan — and crashed. His parents were charged with child endangerment. State police said the boy suffered only minor injuries and authorities drove him to school after he was evaluated at a local hospital for a bump on his head. He arrived shortly after lunch, Sgt. Tom Cunningham said.

It happened around 7:40 a.m. Monday on Route 360, about 61 miles east of Richmond.

The boy, whose name wasn’t released, missed the bus, took the keys to his family’s 2005 Ford Taurus and drove nearly six miles toward school while his mother was asleep, police said.

He made at least two 90-degree turns, passed several cars and ran off the rural two-lane road several times before hitting an embankment and utility pole about a mile and a half from school.

The boy told police he learned to drive playing Grand Theft Auto and Monster Truck Jam video games.

“He was very intent on getting to school,” said Northumberland County Sheriff Chuck Wilkins. “When he got out of the car, he started walking to school. He did not want to miss breakfast and PE.”

His parents, Jacqulyn Deana Waltman, 26, and David Eugene Dodson, 40, are each charged with child endangerment, Wilkins said. Waltman is being held without bond. Dodson was released on a $5,000 bond.

It was not clear if they had attorneys.

The boy and his 4-year-old brother were placed in protective custody.

“This really is a story of miracles,” Wilkins said. “The Lord was with him, along with everybody else on the highway.”

Cleveland, OH — A 15-year-old girl stands accused of distributing nude photos of herself to other minors, and one state legislator is questioning whether or not she should be labeled a sex offender. The girl, a student at Licking Valley High School, was arrested Friday after school officials discovered the materials and brought in a police investigation.

The girl, whose name has not been released, now faces two charges: illegal use of a minor in nudity-oriented material, a second degree felony; and possession of criminal tools, a fifth degree felony.

For an adult convicted of child pornography it requires a Tier II sexual offender classification. However Jennifer Brindisi, a spokeswoman for the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation, said the judge has flexibility with a juvenile of this defendant’s age. The junvenille section of Senate Bill 10 includes a part which states that if the child is a first-time offender and age 14 or 15 that the judge can decide not to make him or her register.

The incident comes immediately following a visit from Licking County Prosecutor Ken Oswalt, who had been visiting area high schools and educating teens on the consequences of such an action. Oswalt talked about the dangers of this behavior, both in terms of personal embarrassment as well as contribution to child pornography on the internet.

Assistant Prosecutor Erin Welch said this week that the investigation into the incident remains open, including exploring whether or not charges will be filed against those minors who received the photos.

Should the prosecturos office decide to bring those teens to court as well, they may face a different section of the same charge pending against the photos’ sender, and may also face having to register as sex offenders. Ohio law 2097.323(A)(3) states that anyone possessing material that shows a minor in a state of nudity is guilty of a fifth degree felony, and may also qualify one as a Tier I sexual offender, which would require annual registration for ten years.

If the girl who took the photos of herself is classified as a sexual offender, she would not be subject to publication on the public websites because she is a juvenile, but she would be required to register for 20 years.

The girl is currently on house arrest, and is not permitted to have access to a cell phone or the Internet without adult supervision and for no other purpose than school work.

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – The death toll in the collapse of a ramshackle school in Haiti rose above 90 on Saturday after rescue workers uncovered a room full of dead, many of them children, officials said.

Civil protection service head Alta Jean-Baptiste said there were 84 people confirmed dead and 150 injured as of noon. Another civil protection official, Michel Joseph Jr., said he had seen eight more bodies, bringing the count to 92.

“We haven’t been able to get them out yet,” Joseph said as rescue workers arrived from the United States and the French Caribbean island of Martinique to help the ill-equipped and impoverished country and U.N. peacekeepers posted there search for survivors.

Officials said 700 children were enrolled at the three-story La Promesse school, but it was not known how many were in the building when it caved in on Friday while class was in session.

Rescuers worked frantically at the school site on the outskirts of Port-of Prince, the Haitian capital, bringing in a crane to lift blocks of concrete. Firefighters from Virginia and rescue workers from Martinique brought sniffer dogs. The search was set to continue for a second night.

President Rene Preval said the church school had been built with hardly any structural steel or cement to hold its concrete blocks together. Debris crushed neighboring residences in the Nerettes community.

The owner of the school and church, Protestant minister Fortin Augustin, was arrested.

“He told me he built the building all by himself. He said he didn’t need an engineer because he had good knowledge of construction,” said prosecutor Joseph Manes Louis, adding that Augustin stated he had once worked on construction sites as a foreman.

Preval, who was at the scene on Saturday, said searchers dropped water and biscuits through gaps in the rubble overnight to children and focused their efforts on reaching them.

“Last night we were sure there were still seven children alive. We got one of them but we have lost all signs of the other six being alive,” Preval said. “Some say they might be sleeping. Others believe they have died.”

As Preval spoke, a rescue worker told him a room full of new victims, mostly students, had been discovered. Officials later said at least 21 bodies were in the room.

At least 35 students, 13 girls and 22 boys, were pulled from the rubble alive overnight.

Two of Chimene Rene’s children were found alive, but two sons, Stevenson Casamajor, 13, and Jeff Casamajor, 15, were still missing.

“We’ve been everywhere. We’ve been to the hospital, we’ve been everywhere looking for them,” she said. “It seems there is no more hope now because it seems that nobody will come out alive from the rubble.”

Crowds of screaming and crying parents searched for their children in the ruins, and roads around the school were so jammed with people that some rescuers had to be brought in by helicopter.

A rescue worker said the dead included an entire philosophy class with the exception of one girl who was alive because she had asked for permission to leave to use the bathroom just before the collapse.

“It is a tragedy, particularly when it involves children,” U.N. mission chief Hedi Annabi said. “I share their sorrow and express my profound sympathy to the relatives of the victims.”

ST. LOUIS (AP) – At least four students from a suburban St. Louis middle school face punishment for allegedly hitting Jewish classmates during what they called “Hit a Jew Day.”

The incident happened last week at Parkway West Middle School in Chesterfield.

District officials said Thursday they believe that fewer than 10 children of the district’s 35 Jewish students were struck.
District spokesman Paul Tandy said that in most cases, the students were hit on the back of their shoulders but one student was slapped in the face.

It began with an unofficial “Spirit Week” among sixth-graders that started harmlessly enough with a “Hug a Friend Day.” Then there was “High Five Day.”

Soon, though, the days moved from friendly to silly. Next there was “Hit a Tall Person Day” and, finally, “Hit a Jew Day.”

District officials believe a handful of children were directly involved. Those who actually struck classmates could face suspension and required counseling, Tandy said. Others who weren’t directly involved but taunted Jewish students or egged on classmates could face lesser penalties.

“There is a mix of sadness and outrage,” Tandy said. “The concern is a lot of kids knew about it and they didn’t take action or say anything.”

Karen Aroesty, St. Louis regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, said this was more than a case of bullying. Officials from the group will meet Friday with district leaders to discuss the matter.

DALLAS — Three girls were disciplined for playing a suggestive song at a North Texas high school pep rally, school administrators said.

The girls, who are on the twirl team, were disciplined after playing Katy Perry’s song “I Kissed A Girl” at a pep rally at Van High School in Van Zandt County.

The song’s lyrics, which are performed by a woman, say, “I kissed a girl, and I liked it.”

Jordan Downey, one of the girls who was disciplined, said she didn’t think the school would care about the song.

“They told us that it probably won’t be a very good a idea, and then we decided, like, it’s not a big deal, we’ll just run for it, no one’s going to care,” she said.

School officials said the girls broke the student code of conduct.

“We did have rules in place, and rules were broken and discipline followed,” said Van Independent School District spokesman Suzie McWilliams.

Downey said she thinks she and the other two girls were disciplined because the song is about a girl kissing another girl.

“It’s a song,” she said. “It’s just like any other song.”

School administrators told NBC 5 the twirlers will not be allowed to attend two football games and one pep rally.

“The pep rally is OK. I could deal with that one,” Downey said. “But the game — I really like to perform, especially since it’s a home game.”

Downey, a senior, has been a member of the twirl team for the last four years.

Taylor Lewis, a senior at Van High, said band members wore stickers that said, “no twirlers, no band” and that the drum line is saying it will not play at the games.

A parent, who did not want to be identified, said she feels the song is inappropriate for school and should not have been played at a pep rally.

Jordon Downey’s mother, Jane, said the situation wasn’t a big deal. She also said the punishment was fair.

She said her daughter isn’t a bad person. The school district agreed and said the matter is closed.

*** WaMu fails. J.P. Morgan buys it up.

*** Lots of screaming, even Treasury guy Paulson was on his knees at one point, but no deal was reached in the Big Bank Bailout of 2008™.

*** There are Chinese people in orbit above the earth RIGHT THIS MOMENT!

*** I responded to a personals ad on Craig’s List. We’ll see what happens, if anything. (No, it wasn’t for hot tranny action, but I’m willing to experiment.)

*** Retards think that Clayton State College lost their accreditation when Clayton County schools did. They didn’t.

KAUHAJOKI, Finland (AP) – A masked gunman whose violent YouTube postings prompted police to question him a day ago opened fire Tuesday at his trade school in western Finland, killing ten people before shooting himself in the head.

Witnesses said panic broke out as the gunman, dressed in black and carrying a large bag, entered the school in Kauhajoki and started firing in a classroom where students were taking an exam. The shootings began just before 11 a.m. local time (0800GMT), as about 150 students were at the Kauhajoki School of Hospitality, 180 miles (300 kilometers) northwest of Helsinki.

“I heard several dozen rounds of shots, in other words it was an automatic pistol,” school janitor Jukka Forsberg told Finnish broadcaster YLE. “I saw some female students who were wailing and moaning and one managed to escape out the back door.”

The gunman had been questioned only Monday by police about YouTube postings in which he is seen firing a handgun, but he was released because there was no legal reason to hold him, Interior Minister Anne Holmlund said.

Police spokesman Jari Neulaniemi said the attacker walked into the school armed with a .22-caliber pistol and some kind of explosive devices that were used to start a fire. He killed 10 people, some of whom were burned beyond recognition, Neulaniemi said. The big bag apparently contained the explosives.

It was Finland’s second school massacre in less than a year and the two attacks had eerie similarities. Both gunmen posted violent clips on YouTube prior to the massacres, both were fascinated by the 1999 Columbine school shootings in Colorado, both attacked their own schools and both died after shooting themselves in the head.

LANCASTER, PA — Responding to Obama’s education policy rollout Tuesday, Sen. John McCain released a new ad leveling stinging though slightly misleading criticism at his Democratic rival.

Ridiculing what it says is his lack of a record when it comes education policy, the campaign’s new spot pointed to his “one accomplishment.”

“Legislation to teach ‘comprehensive sex education’ to kindergartners. Learning about sex before learning to read?” the ad asks rhetorically, referring to a 2003 committee vote Obama cast in the Illinois State Senate.

While the new TV spot leads most voters to believe that Obama supports teaching five year olds about the birds and the bees the legislation, which never passed by the full state senate, called for an “age appropriate” curriculum intended to teach young children how to avoid predators and pedophiles. The bill was supported by a number of prominent state health advocates and also allowed communities and families to opt out if they were not comfortable with the curriculum.

The Obama campaign did not leave anything in its arsenal when firing back at the GOPer.

“It is shameful and downright perverse for the McCain campaign to use a bill that was written to protect young children from sexual predators as a recycled and discredited political attack against a father of two young girls – a position that his friend Mitt Romney also holds. Last week, John McCain told Time magazine he couldn’t define what honor was. Now we know why,” said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton.

The K-12 sex-ed attack point was previously used against Obama by Romney last June who saw it crumble when it turned out supported similar legislation in Massachusetts.

A number of states also have similar education laws, including California, Iowa and Michigan.

OCALA, Fla. (AP) – Authorities say an 8-year-old boy was handing out hundreds of dollars in fake $20 bills at an Ocala elementary school. School officials reported the boy to police on Tuesday.

The fake bills were discovered when a child tried to use one to pay for lunch. An administrator then tracked down several other students with fake bills. Those students all identified the boy.

The boy—who was not identified—was turned over to the Department of Children and Families after authorities learned his guardians had warrants for their arrest.

In all, the counterfeit money added up to 44 notes or $880. Police say they don’t know who produced the fake currency

(Morrow, GA) Clayton County schools are the first in the nation in the last 40 years to lose accreditation, failing to meet eight of nine improvement mandates.

The action came a few hours prior to Gov. Sonny Perdue’s announcement that he was immediately removing four school board members found to have flouted the law. A state administrative judge had recommended their removal.

In an overview of the system’s loss of accreditation, officials for the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools said problems with the board were a factor.

The main problem was that the school system did not have a functioning board, said Mark A. Elgart, president and chief executive officer of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. The board’s conflicts affected everything from teaching and learning to staffing and allocation of resources, accreditors said.

“It affected the entire school system,” Elgart said Thursday afternoon at a news conference. “Today, the students’ education in this particular district is being compromised.”

A loss of accreditation means the 50,000 Clayton students could have trouble getting into some colleges and universities, or receiving scholarship money.

In March, the national Accreditation Commission, which governs SACS, ordered the school system to meet nine mandates or lose accreditation by Sept. 1.

The commission on Tuesday reviewed the school system’s progress and found only one mandate had been fully met, Elgart said.

“There’s positive intent in some cases, but there is no result in some cases,” Elgart said.

On Thursday, Perdue heeded the recommendation by Judge Michael Malihi, of the Office of State Administrative Hearings, and issued an executive order removing board members Michelle Strong, Louise Baines-Hunter, Yolanda Everett and Sandra Scott.

The move means there will be special elections in November seeking someone to serve the remainder of Scott’s and Strong’s terms, both of which end Dec. 31, 2010.

“The fate of the Clayton County School System is now in the hands of the voters,” Perdue said in a statement. “Through the elections to replace these four board members, they can send a clear signal that the kind of behavior that has led to this ruling and the system’s loss of accreditation will not be tolerated. We can hope that this marks a new day for Clayton County, a time in which rebuilding can begin.”

Accreditors had said before the executive order was issued that the governor’s pending decision would not impact their decision on the system’s accreditation. They said new board members would still need to prove that they could follow policy and meet the mandates.

Malihi recommended on Wednesday that the governor remove the four board members. The governor agreed they had violated the state Open Meetings Act and state ethics code.

A team of investigators from across the nation reviewed Clayton’s progress and found no evidence to show the school system had a fully functioning board or permanent superintendent, Elgart said.

Accreditors were particularly concerned that the board gave away its governing authority to superintendent John Thompson, Elgart said. In April, the board signed a contract that allowed the superintendent to violate board policies and circumvent the board, as long as it doesn’t violate state law.

“The current contract cedes authority to the superintendent,” Elgart said. “It not only violates standards for accreditation, but board policy and violates state law.”

Elgart said he and two state board of education members appointed to help Clayton pointed out the flawed contract months ago, but the board didn’t listen.

“They gave the superintendent responsibility that needed to be held by the board,” said state board of education member James Bostic, who was appointed by the governor to help Clayton.

School officials can regain accreditation if they show before Sept. 1, 2009 that have met all the mandates. If successful, accreditation would be restored and would be retroactive to Sept. 1, 2008. If they aren’t successful, the school system would have to start the accreditation process from the beginning, which likely would take about three years.

That means that if Clayton meets the mandates by May, this year’s seniors could graduate with an accredited diploma. Already, juniors and seniors will be able to maintain Hope scholarships because of legislation signed earlier this year by the governor.

School officials have 10 days to file an appeal, but will have to show that SACS was incorrect and they have met all the mandates.

School officials did not return phone calls, but are scheduled to hold a news conference at 4 p.m. Thursday.

However, County Commission Chairman Eldrin Bell said he and Thompson are already laying out a strategy to meet the mandates by this spring.

Students and parents were shocked by the news. Some teenagers broke down in tears in classes and others left early.

Bell asked that students remain in school and teachers continue their duties.

“I’m asking for calm,” Bell said. “We have a window of opportunity still.”

Emory University officials say the early morning discovery of a zebra in a campus building was the latest in a history of animal-related pranks.

Someone — officials figure it was students — broke into Seney Hall on the school’s Oxford campus and placed a live zebra on the third floor. Public safety workers found the full-grown animal when they opened the building about 7 a.m., said Dean Stephen Bowen.

Bowen said it was immediately clear this was part of a long-standing tradition of depositing farm and zoo animals on campus.

The last time it happened, however, was in the 1960s when someone placed a cow in the same building.

“It’s been about 50 years, and we hope it’s another 50 years” before it happens again, Bowen said shortly after Newton County animal control officers removed the zebra about 11:30 a.m. Wednesday.

Bowen said it was unlikely the responsible party would be punished.

“We’re not launching a major manhunt” he joked.

Whoever put the zebra in the building made sure it didn’t get hurt.

“They lined up a row of chairs so the animal couldn’t get close to the windows and injure itself,” Bowen said.

No one immediately reported a missing zebra, Bowen said, leading school officials to believe the owner may have been in on the prank.

This is metro Atlanta’s second zebra incident in recent weeks.

(prior zebra story)

CLEVELAND — Rolling downhill in a bus with his screaming classmates and no driver, a fast-acting 11-year-old jumped behind the wheel Monday and steered the bus into a pillar, stopping it from careening out of control.

Some children jumped out the side door and rolled into the street. The driver, Michael Weir, had stopped for fuel and was in the station’s restroom when the bus started to roll with 27 children aboard.

Fifteen children suffered minor injuries and were treated at hospitals and released. The boy who stopped the bus likely saved the children from worse injuries, authorities said.

“This kid did some quick thinking,” said Larry Gray, a fire department spokesman.

Weir, whose bus was carrying kindergartners through seventh-graders, bought $40 of diesel at a station across the street from Progressive Field, home of the Cleveland Indians.

State law prohibits bus drivers from leaving their vehicles at any time when students are on board and drivers are not allowed to stop for gas during their route, said Scott Blake, spokesman for the Ohio Department of Education.

Authorities were trying to find out more about why Weir left the bus, which was carrying students to Arts Academy Community School West, a charter school that opened this year.

Conner Strickland, the station’s manager, said he banged on the restroom door to alert the driver and then chased the bus, which was picking up speed. He heard screams and watched in horror as some children leapt from the bus.

“My heart dropped,” Strickland said. “I’m surprised none of them got hit. There was a lot of traffic.”

The boy who stopped the bus told police he first tried to pull the emergency brake. When that didn’t work, he grabbed the wheel.

Barreling down a side street that swoops through an industrial area, the bus rolled about 300 feet, hopped over a curb and onto a sidewalk before it struck the pillar of a bridge that carries Interstate 90 into downtown.

If it had kept going, the bus would have picked up speed and could have flipped where the street makes a sharp turn, said police Lt. Thomas Stacho.

It’s not clear why the bus started to roll, Stacho said. Investigators did not find any mechanical problems and a gas station employee watching the bus said none of the children appeared to tamper with anything, he said.

Weir, 57, has a valid commercial driver’s license but wasn’t registered with the state as required, police said.

Ohio bus drivers must obtain a state license certification every six years that includes a criminal background check and a review of their driving record, education department spokeswoman Karla Carruthers said.

Weir, who ran down the hill after the bus, was taken to a hospital with chest pains, authorities said.

Officials at the school declined to comment. The bus is operated by Aqua Limousine Ground Transportation, he said. A message seeing comment was left with the company.