PREP SCHOOL VIOLENCE

To the Editor:
Re "After Dormitory Attacks, Boarding Schools Move to Reduce Risks" (news
article, June 17):

The real problem is not the breaking of school rules; it is the
inability of private schools to differentiate between normal
adolescent behavior and nasty interpersonal behavior.

Your article describes well-intentioned administrators at Northfield
Mount Hermon trying to deal with a minority of troubled teenagers.

As a psychotherapist who was until recently affiliated with Northfield
Mount Hermon, I saw good teenagers suffer the indignities of
urinalysis, phone taps, police-like interrogations and harassment from
predatory classmates. Meanwhile, truly disturbed students maneuvered
their way through the system.

The assumption that casual drug and alcohol use equals pathology has
led Northfield Mount Hermon to toss out the very students it needs to
embrace and empower the troublemakers it needs to confront.

TOM RAYMOND JR.
Chapel Hill, N.C., June 22, 2000