Punishment For Out-Of-School Behavior?

Punishment For Out-Of-School Behavior?

Abby Detert, Reporter

Do you think that schools should be able to punish students for things they do outside of school? Personally, I don’t think that schools should be able to do that because what students do outside of school isn’t the business of the school. If a student is doing something outside of school they shouldn’t have to be worried that their school may not like something that they are doing and cause a problem for them at school. They should be able to relax outside of school and do as they please without the restrictions set by the school that has to be followed in school and on school property.

A restriction to this should be if a student is creating an unsafe environment for another student. This would include cyberbullying or using violence against another person outside of school. That in my opinion should be the only time a school should punish a student for something that they did in their personal life. 

This leads to the fact that if schools are punishing students for out-of-school behavior they are getting involved in your personal life without you asking them, which is a major invasion of privacy. Kids and teens don’t get all that much privacy with a lot of things in their lives, to begin with as they are minors but they shouldn’t have to actively worry about their privacy being invaded by their school about something that doesn’t have to do with their school.

Although another exception many may think of is sports. Many people believe that if a student does something that is in violation of the Student Code of Conduct they must be punished no matter if it is in school or not. This isn’t fully true, students can be punished if they do something violating the Code of Conduct in school or at a school-related function outside of school but it is not said that a school can punish you if they catch you doing something violating the code outside of school that they can punish you for it.

Though students don’t just have to worry about the Student Code of Conduct they also have to worry about CCA’s Good Conduct Rule. The Good Conduct Rule is CCA’s personal code of conduct that was approved by the Clear Creek Amana Community School District Board of Directors.

These are some of the reasons that I believe that schools shouldn’t be able to punish their students for actions that they do outside of school unless they are creating an unsafe environment for another student or they are doing something wrong at a school-related function.