You wouldn’t think your kids could get suspended from school just because you exercised your constitutionally guaranteed rights off campus, but this is apparently what happened to one New Jersey family. It’s not that the school district jumped the gun, either — rather, the punitive action was prescribed by official policy. As Fox News reported Sunday:
A New Jersey high school came under fire Friday after it allegedly suspended two students over a gun photo taken during a family visit to a shooting range.
News of the unnamed students’ suspension circulated through a Lacey Township Facebook group, according to NJ.com.
Amanda Buron, a Lacey resident and family friend of one of the suspended students said one of the photos shared on SnapChat featured four rifles, magazines, and a gun duffel with the caption “fun day at the range,” NJ.com reported.
Buron said the two students received a five-day in-school suspension after the picture drew the attention of Lacey Township High School officials, who argued that it violated the school’s policy on weapons possession.
The school district shortly faced community backlash for the alleged suspension, with many calling for people to appear at the school board’s next meeting on Monday to protest the decision.
Unsurprisingly, district officials hid under their desks when asked for comment. As NJ.com reported, “Lacey schools Superintendent Craig Wigley said in an email to NJ Advance Media on Thursday that ‘information posted on social media is incorrect’,” but “declined to say what aspect of the accounts posted on social media is inaccurate.” He also claimed that he couldn’t discuss student-related “private matters.” This is a typical educator dodge.
What the district couldn’t dodge was the reality of an overreaching policy, which actually stated that “students could be suspended for up to a year if they are ‘reported to be in possession of a weapon of any type for any reason or purpose on or off school grounds,’” NJ.com further related.
This inspired pro-Second Amendment groups to threaten a lawsuit, as educators have no legitimate power to ban students from exercising constitutionally protected rights anywhere and everywhere and at all times — even off school grounds. It’s as if a government school prohibited students from expressing certain political viewpoints off campus; it would be the government suppression of free speech.
As the Association of New Jersey Rifle & Pistol Clubs’ (ANJRPC’) executive director Scott Bach put it, after sending a cease and desist letter to the district, “Schools do not have the authority to chill the rights of their students off of school grounds, and this blatant infringement of constitutional rights will not be tolerated.... The policy has got to go,” NJ.com also informed.
And it did go.
NJ.com reported today that the “Lacey school district quietly changed” the policy, scrapping the off-school-grounds prohibition and eliminating suspension-length specificity. “‘Students are forbidden to carry any type of weapon or simulated weapon to school,’ the revamped policy states. ‘Strict disciplinary action and legal actions will result if this occurs,’” the news organ detailed.
More at: https://www.thenewamerican.com/cultu...ed-from-school
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