Update on school's fine for hunting

[Classicvette63]

As you may remember my niece got fined by her school because she took off to go hunting last year. My sister fought it and the fine was dismissed by the judge today. He said it was ridiculous that a school would fine a student for going hunting. I had every intention of going, but my sister didn't tell me when it was. Something about her being afraid if things didn't go right I might turn the place upside down.:rolleyes: :D Can't imagine why she had that notion. My sister also added that Tiff was planning on going hunting this year and she hoped that she wouldn't have to go thru this again. The judge remarked that he didn't forsee her having any more problems, while looking squarely at the principal.

I'll give credit where credit is due, kudos to the judge. We need more like him.

[BILLY D.]

there is justice in the world. glad everything turned out well for your family.

i still don't understand how a school can fine anyone. i always thought that was a responsibility of of a city, county, state or federal judicial system.

good luck to the youngin' this year.

[rainydays]

When I was a youngster, my dad would take me out of school to hunt. Basically my note to my teachers stated I was sick. Nobody ever asked any questions. He tried to get permission from school to let me out for hunting, but it was always a no go.
When my kids got to be hunting age, they also took sick days to hunt. Never had any fallout from the school. Basically it always graveled me that kids could get out of school to travel all over to golf or play volley ball etc., but going hunting was like committing some crime. Glad I didn't have to deal with fines etc. Not sure what I would have done. Just my thoughts--tr

[fabsroman]

Billy,

Libraries can fine you for not bringing a book back, so why shouldn't schools be able to fine students for not coming to class? "Just kidding, but seriously." That is a good movie quote. If you think about it some more, government agencies have plenty of power to fine people. How about the building authority. They can shut down a job and fine a person without a permit because the legislature has given them that power. Essentially, agencies are an arm of the executive branch of authority and are given the power to fine people to enforce things.

At the end of the day, I don't think a school should ever fine a child, or a child's parents, for the child not being in school. The child should just have to spend time in detention.

Classic,

Glad to hear that things went well.

While I am not a big proponent of lying, I think a little white lie in this case would have saved a lot of trouble on your and your sister's part. Like Rainydays, my mom and dad would always say that I was sick when I took off from school to hunt. It just made life a lot simpler.

In the end, schools cannot make exceptions for missing school for hobbies outside of the school system. If it is a school sanctioned sport or activity, kids are allowed to skip class. If schools allowed children to miss class for outside hobbies, I am sure there would be plenty of objectionable stuff being used for missing school and the school system would spend more time figuring out what is acceptable and what isn't and teaching the children will suffer. It would just be extremely tough for the schools to police.

[Valigator]

Good for her, good for her...
and no I dont agree with the white lie being more appropiate. I think its refreshing and notable she didnt lie...the less we put these things further back in the closet, the better off we all will be. People need to stand up for hunting, and this was a perfect example. You need to read about some of the crap going on in our school system down here...the state is in the process of firing 100's of teachers for buying fake degrees on line...keep in mind their degrees are directly proportionate to thier salaries....our teachers in the state of Florida and no telling what other states are putting our kids thru the ringers with expanded days, SAT's etc...while the teachers are buying degrees online? Alot of you might want to put a bug in the ears of your investigative reporters in your area, to find out if its going on in your state...

[gd357]

Congrats on the decision. One of the better judgement calls that I've heard of lately by a judge... I had a bit of difficulty from a teacher when I was in high school about cutting out to go hunting. If we had a longer season, I would have understood his position (well, probably not) but we get all of one week for gun season, and I wasn't going to waste it sitting somewhere I didn't want to be when season was out.;) I was able to bypass that, but it still was a minor source of irritation.

gd

[fabsroman]

Val and GD,

What you guys are missing about my post is that there are a million activities out there that a parent can think are more important than school. Heck, a lot of parents don't even care if their kids go to school.

The issue is where does the school system draw the line regarding abscence from school. How many days can a child miss for hunting? Can children miss school to go to concerts? How about ballet outside of school. Can they miss school for ballet lessons or competitions? The list can go on and on. I think my high school had a pretty good system. A student was allowed a certain number of sick days with a note from mom and dad, a certain number of sick days with a doctor's note, and 5 unexcused abscences. However, if a student had more than 5 unexcused abscenses, they failed the semester. A semester was 90 days long and 5 days was more than 5% of the school days.

Can children really afford to miss more than 5% of their education? A line needs to be drawn that accomodates the parents and children, but also ensures that the children get an education. I am all for hunting, but not at the expense of an education. There aren't many people out there that become professional hunters, just as there aren't many that become professional athletes in comparison to the population. Plus, even if they are professional hunters and athletes, I still think it is better to have an education even in those professions.

Simply put, if you make an exception for hunting, you have to make an exception for a lot of things. However, I don't think a parent should be fined for letting their child go hunting, but guidelines need to be set and enforced.

[gd357]

fabs, I might have missed 5 or 6 days a year in high school. It just so happened that most of them coincided with deer season. I'm not saying that I think absenteeism is good, I'm just saying that my priorities were in order. I didn't like high school, but it did teach me a lot about putting up with people and places you don't like to accomplish a goal. As far as how much school one can afford to miss is really dependent on the individual student. I could have missed 20% of high school and probably still carried a B average. The problem is, they have to make the rules to cover the slowest student, not the fastest. I didn't like it, but I lived with it. The system ain't perfect, but it's necessary for public schools.

gd

[Valigator]

Fabs, most of us are here because we have a strong affiliation to hunting, we are here because we believe hunting teaches our children to be better human beings....I took ballet for 12 years, taught me how to sit in a skirt, but hunting teaches our children things the school will never teach......thier is no comparison....you are very adversarial these days...if I say its black, you say its white, why is that? Law School?

[fabsroman]

Val,

I am pretty adversarial on subjective topics, especially when there isn't a clear answer, yet people think there is a black and white. Always, have been, always will be. Law school just gave me the ability to argue my point better.

Like I said, we "think" that hunting teaches us things we need to know to survive and it teaches our children certain values. With that said, I have seen some pretty pathetic/undisciplined hunters out there. Guess it doesn't work on everybody.

My point is that neither the school system nor a judge can say, yeah, hunting is an excused absence, but ballet or competitive cycling is not. Trust me, I did plenty of competitive cycling when I was younger. Even raced against George Hincapie who was Lance Armstrong's teammate/leiutenant, and school didn't allow me to leave early on Friday's to attend races held in upstate New York, South Carolina, and Arizona early Saturday morning. As far as I am concerned, sports and hunting and a million other things can teach discipline. So, should the school system turn a blind eye to abscences for anything the parent thinks is beneficial for the child?

Where do we draw the line? How can we say on thing is better than the other? How about letting parents take their children to PETA protests of hunting because it teaches the children to be stong and voice their opinion?

What if a parent is a survival nut and doesn't think that books and an education are worth anything? Should the child be excused from the entire year of school for that reason? I use extreme scenarios in most of my posts to try and prove my point. Where does a school system or a government draw the line on school attendance? Children already have Saturday and Sunday off to do whatever they and their parents want. How many more days do they need?

As far as disagreeing with you on everything, I think you will find a recent post wherein I said your letter to the editor was pretty good. Just not too much to write about when you and I agree. Just like reading some of TBO's posts. I read them, agree with them, and pretty much move on. Kind of like his post about the 5 "gangsters" that were killed in New Orleans by police when 8 gangsters shot at a construction crew. The only thing I didn't like about that post was that it wasn't 8 dead gangsters.

[skeeter@ccia.com]

My excuse while in school read: Went with his father. Nothing was ever said...that way I guess there was only enough information given without having to do the white lie thing..I hated to miss school...you might not know it but you learn something every day there...and when you get back, you are lost somewhat 'till ya figure it out. Now we don't have to worry too much because they give everyone off the first day of deer. Woo hoo..if my boss was only like that..I liked it written somewhere on HC If you think school sucks, wait till ya get a boss....
fabs...how would you handle this?Legal grounds....My brothers kids would not get up for school. He had in the past tossed water on them etc..kicked a little butt and what ever he needed to get them up..this is because the school had told him if they would not come to school, he would be fined....so I guess he had to do what needed to get them there. As a parent. Now the kicker is when the police brought home the one boy..10..that was running town while everyone else slept...the police told my brother right in front of the rest if he laid a hand on them (spank?) or tossed water etc on them again he would go right to jail...and be fined...then told the kids if he ever spanked them all they had to do is call police and he would be arrested...His boys held that over his head to this day..so.....sum it up...be fined for not getting them up for school....be fined for getting them up for school...??? ..whew am I glad I had girls...and I couldn't pay them to miss a day..lol.

[Valigator]

Darn Fabs, I got on here at 8:10 to edit that post and take that sentence out....your up too early for me....sorry about that...

[fabsroman]

Skeeter,

How I would have handled your brother's situation is to ask the police officer to put that in writing so that he could show it to the school board and judge when he is fined for not getting his kids to school. Then, I would look up the law on physical punishment, spank my child in front of a video camera the next time he even mentioned what the police officer said, and then deal with the police officer and police department in Court if they ever charged me with anything and then sue each of them civily for false arrest.

It truly bothers the heck out of me when police officers think they know everything. If anything, that police officer should have scared the crap out of the kid seeing as how the kid was out late at night running around.

With that said, LEO's do face some serious issues. Exactly what is considered child abuse and what isn't? Throwing a glass of water on a child in the morning to get them up definitely doesn't qualify. Leaving welts and bruises on a child does. Beatings out of anger qualify too. I believe in spankings and I also believe in punishment. I think a parent needs to be strict from the beginning, be fair with punishment, and carry through with threatened punishment as long as the threatened punishment is legal.


Val,

It isn't that I am up too early, it is just that I get to bed way too late. Hit the sack at 4:00 in the morning last night with a ton of work left to do and got up at 8:30 this morning to be at a client's place only to have him drunk at work. Sad thing is that he owns the business. Thanks for thinking about erasing that sentence, but then I wouldn't have had as much to write about last night.