The Right to an Education Does Not Create a Right to Hurt Other People

Okay, so apparently I was wrong about this.

I said in a recent video that if a kid throws up in the classroom, they get sent home, right?

It only makes sense.

And I was making the analogy that if behavior is so disruptive or violent that learning can't take place, a kid should get sent home for that as well.

And apparently it's now the policy in a lot of districts that a kid has to throw up twice before they get sent home, or they have to throw up three times before they get sent home, or an adult has to see it.

There are all these rules around what throw up gets you sent home.

Like, have we lost our minds with policies like these?

Like, I get that you have to be a little bit skeptical with kids that might be faking.

You know, you have to kind of do your diligence.

But, like, that's a problem we can solve.

Having to throw up three times to go home, like, where in the world do we get this idea that it's kind?

that it's helpful to learning to kids, to make kids stay at school after they've thrown up once or even twice.

The whole idea that a kid can learn and continue to be at school just because we want them to, through sheer force of our will, we can make a kid who clearly is not a frame of mind to learn anything today because they're puking their guts out, or because their behavior is so bad that they're disrupting the whole class.

Like in both of those cases, I think the analogy holds in both of those cases, what we're going for, like the learning that we're trying to ensure can continue to happen has already stopped.

Like it can not happen if a kid is so sick that they're throwing up or if a kid's behavior is so bad that the class has to leave the room or whatever.

Like there are these situations where learning is obviously not taking place and obviously not going to until something changes.

And yet these policies are trying to live in just denial of that.

Like in what universe, like on what planet do people think that you can make a kid who is not in a mind frame to learn because of their sickness or their behavior?

Like you can't just turn that around by sheer force of will.

And I think when it comes to behavior, again, I'm not talking about students with IEPs.

I think in a lot of cases we have to not send students with IEPs home because there are different interventions that have to be put in place to deal with like work avoidance and making sure the environment's right and things like that.

But if you have a kid who is just behaving so dangerously that no one is learning, or they're tearing up their classroom, or they're throwing things, they're endangering other people, they're endangering themselves, does anybody think anybody is learning here?

And don't come at me with FAPE, free and appropriate public education.

Yes, every student deserves the right to an education, but that doesn't mean every student deserves a captive audience for their horrible behavior, right?

Like, no child is entitled to a room full of witnesses while they throw a tantrum.

No child is entitled to a teacher or an aide that they can abuse until they get tired and feel like stopping.

Like, that is not what the right to an education entitles you to.

And the right to be around other people, period, is not an inalienable right.

If you are unsafe, you might not get to be around other people for a while.

There's just no inherent right to an audience, a victim, a classroom full of victims, if your behavior is not safe.

And I think we've just got to put that basic boundary back in place.

And of course, if kids are actually throwing up, let them go home.