By ALEXA FRIEDMAN – Viewpoints Editor
Sometimes, valued friendships may get in the way of doing the right thing.
After a weekend of camping with her family, your peer opens her backpack to find the knife she forgot to remove before returning to school. She is making no effort to conceal it, unaware that she is in violation of the Clarke Central High School Code of Conduct.
Cartoon by Katie Downs
You know she has innocent intentions, but having a weapon on campus is against the rules – and the law. The teacher doesn’t notice. Your heart bangs urgently against the inside of your chest, as if trying to escape as you face the dilemma: Should I tell the teacher? And risk being a snitch – impossible. Or, should I look the other way and break the rules myself? That doesn’t seem right either. Truth be told, there is no correct way to handle the situation when a peer brings a weapon to school.
Since kindergarten, there has been an understanding that kids aren’t supposed to tell an adult when other kids break the rules. No matter who it is, kids don’t side with the teacher unless they want to be “tattle-tales,” “snitches” or “rats.” Our allegiance to our peers is tested when the Code of Conduct tells us that we are required to inform a faculty member if we see someone with a weapon at school.
On one hand, in addition to being against the rules, it’s dangerous to have one at school no matter what the student’s intentions may be. On the other hand, whether it’s a gun or even a pen style laser pointer, if a student is found with a weapon on school property, he or she will face severe disciplinary punishments from the school and criminal charges.
Recently, I faced the problem of having to choose between doing the right thing by my peers and doing the right thing by the rules when a classmate of mine had a weapon. It didn’t take me long to realize that both options felt wrong. The student made no attempt to conceal the weapon, but he was not trying to threaten anyone and appeared to not have been thinking about the consequences.
The mood in the class rippled into tension as word of his actions carried through whispers around the room. I could tell that we shared the thought, “What should I do?”.
I know he was the one who brought the knife to school, he was the one who was breaking the rules, but I’m the one who still feels bad that he got in so much trouble for making a mistake.
Honestly, I wish I just told him to put it away and never bring it to school again, but I would definitely have been breaking the rules. The rule seems simple to follow — how hard is it to not bring weapons to school? In fact, when we sign our names to the Code of Conduct on the first day of school each year, it’s almost laughable that we need to be told not to do it.
But students break the rules accidentally all of the time by bringing nail files, pocket knives and perfume to school.
While there may not be a proper way to handle the situation when a peer brings a weapon to school, if everyone could just be more aware of what we can and cannot bring to school, it would save everyone the trouble of deciding whether or not to rat someone out.
