NOTHING REDEEMS ZERO TOLERANCE RULES

To embrace the concept of "zero tolerance" in public schools is to put
ironclad rules over fairness, to suggest that school officials are not
capable of making the kind of nuanced judgments that every citizen should
be taught to make.

Sound too harsh?

Then refer to a report last week in the Register tracking the lives of some
area students who have been punished under zero-tolerance policies. Often
enough, good kids with promising futures dripped out of school or attended
colleges below their potential - because of the severe punishments imposed
for one unfortunate mistake.

"It destroyed my boy. Not one positive has come out of it," was a typical
parent's response.

Zero tolerance is the idea that for certain Very Bad Things, the rules
impose harsh punishments - no matter what the extenuating circumstances, or
the details of the infraction. It has become popular in public schools, and
increasingly in our legal system, because it sounds so tough, even if
there's scant evidence of any deterrence value.

ZT works like this: Drugs, or alcohol, or guns or sexual harassment are
deemed to be so malevolent that any infraction must be punished by the full
extent of the rules. No excuses. No nothing. By adopting this approach,
officials believe that it will deter other students from doing similar
misdeeds.

But while it's reasonable to deter bad behavior, it is unreasonable to
deter bad behavior, it is unreasonable to excessively punish any individual
for that purpose. That's why our society, for instance, doesn't chop off
the hands of shoplifters as a way to "send a message" to would-be thieves.
In a just society, punishments must attempt to fit the crime.

The problem is that zero tolerance allows no distinctions. If a student is
caught bringing a knife to school with the intent of attacking someone, he
or she will be expelled. But so is the student who bought a souvenir knife
on a class trip to Hawaii and the one who brought an exacto knife to class
to help with a school project. Those last two examples are real-life
incidents from Orange County.

Typically, students caught in the zero-tolerance web are transferred from
their own school to a "continuation" school, which is set up to serve
problem students. They are taken away from their friends, deprived of
extracurricular activities and athletics and even cheated out of
scholarships and good educations because the action leaves a permanent
blemish on their school record.

Sometimes the students are accused of doing something in clear violation of
the rules, as with the nine Foothill High student officers who were accused
last month of drinking alcohol at an off-campus event. While punishment is
warranted, punishments triggered by zero tolerance are typically out of
proportion to the crime. In this case, the students are facing involuntary
transfers.

Come on, how many school administrators, or any other pro-zero tolerance
adults for that matter, never took an illicit drink while they were a high
school student? Has it been that long ago that they can't muster even a
sliver of compassion?

"It's a one-size-fits-all policy which I believe is No. 1 lazy, No. 2
Draconian in many instances. Being 17 or 18 means that you make some
mistakes," David Shores told us; he is a local attorney who has defended
more than 100 students who have run afoul of zero tolerance policies.

Clearly officials need to look at a student's intent as well as the
circumstances surrounding the event, just as our justice system typically
does. Yet teachers and principals often are unwilling to come to a
reasonable punishment or solution because the written policy eliminates
their "wiggle room," Mr. Shores said.

Zero-tolerance defenders portray these arguments as being soft on
wrongdoing, or as an attempt to undermine a school's authority to prevent
bed and dangerous behavior. But they are no such things.

If anything, zero tolerance teaches students that the rules are
heavy-handed and unjust, that officials cannot distinguish between an
exacto knife and an assault rifle, that no matter how honorable one lives,
a single mistake will trigger the full force of the law. Such rules drive
people away from the system, Gil Geis told us; he is professor emeritus of
criminology at UC Irvine. And they breed cynicism and disrespect for the
law, because zero tolerance "treats things that aren't equal as equal," and
it takes a dogmatic and punitive approach to misdeeds.

Yet schools have embraced zero tolerance in a big way, although some
systems are taking a second look at their policies. But reform is tough
because it's politically risky to come out against zero-tolerance policies
- - no one wants to be perceived as soft on drugs or weapons.

But what does it say about America's education system if few school leaders
are willing to stand up for fairness, or take a stand against damaging a
kid's future for one misdeed?

Until enough educators muster a little courage, there may be only one
approach to take: the legal system. One multimillion-dollar verdict, Mr.
Shore suggests, might be all it takes to convince school systems to rethink
these unjust and counterproductive policies.