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I was suspended several times in high school for insubordination.
Some teachers would insult or belittle and I would stand up/fight back. One accused me of lying when I did not and I really stood my ground on that I was so furious. I did not "fight back" without cause and disrespect.
Years later I lived next door to a high school principle, told him this story. He said they all knew the bad teachers but could never not side with them - the kid was punished whether they deserved it or not.
I also had excellent attendance and grades. If our mom came to the school we would not have to do the three days, we could get right back in.
I was dumb and thought this "permanent record" bull**** was real, thankfully it isn't.
I was asked to leave class twice in high school and visit the Vice Principal. Once was for being a smart-aleck in Geometry class. The other was for retaliating to a physical hit from another student in Art class. I can't argue with either. The teacher's were justified.
I was a semi-regular member of the 2:45 club (detention) as I had these bad habits of smoking on campus, leaving campus w/o permission, and other little violations of the student code.
Luckily, I was never caught doing anything that would have netted a suspension or expulsion.
I really wasn't a bad kid. Honest! Just an adventurous kind of guy in a stodgy Catholic high school environment. Almost like Kevin Bacon in Footloose (less the dancing and the VW)!
I never gave this any thought but now that you ask... nope.. I never even had detention or was ever sent to the principals office. I was always well behaved in school but I was that way outside of school too. I was far from a goody two shoes though.
Weekends.. all bets were off and summers were one endless beach party. Gads, I miss those days.
What was in-school suspension actually like? Based on my experience in detention, I imagine it being excruciatingly and painfully boring, like a series of multiple, back-to-back detentions. Chained to a desk for hours with dead silence all around, bored out your mind.
Excrutiatingly boring is a good way to describe it. The clock has never moved so slow in my life. Definitely NOT the "Breakfast Club " experience.
I grew up in a time when teachers could hit children with giant rulers or make them kneel on wire hangers in a corner for an hour, nuns at church hit kids with giant pointer sticks & it was common for parents to smack around kids, even in public, as well. No one intervened & assumed the kid did something terrible in order for their parent to act out in such a way.
We were terrified of authority figures of any kind & for you youngens who don't know about such things, authority figures often hit out of frustration & their own poor life choices, rather than kids doing anything wrong at all. So, if we knew we could be hit for doing nothing, we didn't do anything to initiate it.
Additionally, if you went home to tell mum the teacher or nun hit you, you were hit again for doing something wrong, as obviously they wouldn't hit for nothing. We learned that lesson once.
So, no, I was a straight A student... too terrified not to be. I agreed with little that was taught me, but I was smart enough to keep it to myself, knowing I could express myself & not get hit for it, in adulthood. Never got detention, even. The violence quotient was too severe. Someday I'll get over it. I'm glad I never had kids... if someone put their hands on them, I'd be in prison.
Did you actually serve any of those detentions or did you just blow them off?
Also - a motorcycle in 10th grade...that's pretty impressive.
It must have taken a studied defiance of the rules to get that many detenrions. The most I had ever heard of before in one year was my nephew, who had 51 on the books the last year before he stopped going completely. My worst year was about 15-20.
Nope, never did serve even one of them. Some carried over from my freshman year but I did pack on the majority in my sophomore year.
Actually, I had a motorcycle and my first ticket at 13 yrs old. Rode to school the minute I got my permit at 15 (freshman) and in fact didn't own a car until I was in my 20's.
I grew up in a time when teachers could hit children with giant rulers or make them kneel on wire hangers in a corner for an hour, nuns at church hit kids with giant pointer sticks & it was common for parents to smack around kids, even in public, as well. No one intervened & assumed the kid did something terrible in order for their parent to act out in such a way.
We were terrified of authority figures of any kind & for you youngens who don't know about such things, authority figures often hit out of frustration & their own poor life choices, rather than kids doing anything wrong at all. So, if we knew we could be hit for doing nothing, we didn't do anything to initiate it.
Additionally, if you went home to tell mum the teacher or nun hit you, you were hit again for doing something wrong, as obviously they wouldn't hit for nothing. We learned that lesson once.
So, no, I was a straight A student... too terrified not to be. I agreed with little that was taught me, but I was smart enough to keep it to myself, knowing I could express myself & not get hit for it, in adulthood. Never got detention, even. The violence quotient was too severe. Someday I'll get over it. I'm glad I never had kids... if someone put their hands on them, I'd be in prison.
That was very common in Catholic schools.. but not in public school.
And yet Al Gore and Obama pushed for 18 to be the compulsory attendance age...
Your comment prompted me to look up the current law; I had no idea it was established in 1963! I thought it was around mid-70's ...
My husband is a bit older (the year he graduated HS was the same year I started Kindergarten) but attended the same district as I. It's common knowledge in his family that starting at around age 10, he was only in school up until spring break. He says his dad would shave his head & he'd be shipped off to Kansas to work the family farm until the next school year started.
I had thought "Well; you couldn't do that now" but apparently you were not supposed to do it then?
I feel like the only positive thing that could come of changing the age to 18 would be that it would prohibit the schools from their "easy out" in regards to the older, struggling students who go to class but get poor grades. Now; any student that does not help with annual "performance" ratings gets booted to alternative programs even if they would benefit from the structure & social interaction of traditional schools.
In my day; "skipping" meant you showed up to school, put your bag in your locker & kept right on going out a back door. I did attend 1st period because that was band & I was 1st chair. Now; skipping means kids just refuse to go at all & parents have to go to work & don't make them (or don't know) go. Then the parent gets served a summons for truancy court. It's a fiasco.
I moved quite often and took on most of the school bullies for picking on someone else. Of course, at a wrestling weight in the 116 to 128 lb. class I was a terror for those only 160 to 180 lbs. I was suspended in high school at least eight times, and held the school fight record for several years after I graduated.
Some adults with Masters' Degree in Counseling didn't seem to see the big picture. Or any picture. What pissed me off was that decades later I found out my sister coming along two years later had a lot of adult?? teachers take out on her they weren't able to shive to me and get away with it. Adults? please.
Won about a third, drew a third, and then had the crap kicked out of me. I never really did learn. I'm still fighting bullies but am much am more subtle now.
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