This is a short essay discussing the concept of zero tolerance in High school.

Essay by TheMorningstaRHigh School, 11th gradeA, January 2004

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Implementation of Zero Tolerance

' Jeanne Wright, of the Washington Post states, " Teachers across the country-from tough inner city schools to affluent suburban districts- are growing increasingly frustrated and fearful that their classrooms and hallways are being disrupted and turned into battlefields by a few violent and ill-behaved students intent on creating chaos'"(Grapes). Because of this escalating violence and drug use on the schools grounds, zero tolerance has evolved. The zero tolerance policy provides parameters for the individual student, the educators, and the community, thereby diminishing the opportunity for distracting influences in the educational environment. Embracing the concept of zero tolerance to fit a community and its school will help provide a better educational environment, thus creating an opportunity to achieve better academic performance.

" The zero-tolerance policies largely grew out of the Safe and Drug-Free School Act of 1994, which stipulated that schools had to expel any student found with a weapon, or lose federal aid"(Johnson).

This concept has evolved for the sole purpose of preventing violence in an educational environment. A student should feel safe and comfortable while they are in a learning facility, and should not have to worry about his/her life being in jeopardy every time while on school grounds. If a student attempts to bring harm to any other student, then they will receive consequences for that student's specific action. 'According to a Michigan high school principal, "From what I understand zero-tolerance will not allow students to bring guns and violent object to the schools. If a student brings a weapon to school, that there will be specific punishment that will come towards that child (de) pending on the severity of what they had done or what the child had brought'" (Dunbar 91). This statement is a general consensus by educational community as a...