Eighteen-year-old Allen Lee, a student at Cary-Grove High School in Illinois, recently handed in a creative writing assignment which disturbed his teacher so much she reported it to authorities. (I haven’t read the essay but the Northwest Herald reports it “made references to violence, drug use, and a dream about a shooting spree where he had sex with dead bodies.”) This kind of behaviour has been identified as a “red flag” in identifying students who are likely to harm others. While I don’t agree that arresting this kid was the answer, I salute the teacher for reporting disturbing writings to her school’s administrators. His privacy should have been respected, and now that this story is in the news, that privacy will not be regained. Rather than immediately alerting police, the school should perhaps have directed this student into some counseling and informed his parents in order to determine whether he was a real threat to himself or others. The media will say that this is a case of overreaction as a direct result of the Virginia Tech shootings and the fact that Seung-Hui Cho wrote disturbing things that were noticed by teachers. You know who else did? Eric Harris. And Dylan Klebold. And Mitchell Johnson.
So although it was handled incorrectly and with insensitivity, I think this is more a case of a school having learned a valuable lesson and less about infringing on this student’s right to the freedom of speech. There are so many teachers who fail to act above and beyond their academic duties, and now that one of them has done so in a controversial manner, her actions will be questioned and she’ll be hung out to dry. The bottom line is that this student didn’t write this story in his private life or in a journal…he wrote something violent and disturbing and then handed it to a TEACHER, and that’s the significant point I think is being missed here.
Hello Amy,
While your point is well taken that the creative writing teacher did the right thing by reporting her concerns to the school authorities, the fact the principal immediately called in law enforcement to have him arrested is an overreaction. Calling law enforcement should only be resorted to after all possible intermediate steps are exhausted. By doing this, the principal and the school authorities basically sent the following implicit messages:
1. Writings that do not conform to school officials’ ideals of “normalcy” which often disapproves of publicly expressing dark, sinister, or even sad thoughts will be punished in the most draconian manner possible. This may include the heavy weight of the state in the guise of law enforcement and the court system. I remembered the stories of relatives who lived in similar systems…under the rule of Communist regimes.
2. A teacher’s instructions must not be completely trusted as one can be punished even when one complies with them. Allen Lee was following the teacher’s instructions to engage in a “freewriting” exercise where she specifically said to “not censor” one’s thoughts in writing.
3. If one is considered a social misfit, live in continued fear of being labeled and possibly punished by the school authorities for not fitting their ideals of what is “normal”. I can thank my lucky stars I did not go to a “normal” American high school if this would be the kinds of school officials I would have had to deal with. Allen Lee would have probably been better off in an academically-oriented public magnet school like the one I attended.
Personally, I do not find the principal’s actions nor the implicit messages they send conducive to the encouraging of the creativity and free-thinking necessary for creating a new generation of creative writers…or at least, persons who could forthrightly explore and grapple with their innermost thoughts without the fear that those thoughts are “wrong” or “criminal” in any way.
If this had happened in my high school, here were the steps that would have been taken:
1. Teacher takes student aside to discuss the essay.
2. Reports incident with copy of essay to principal and counselor.
3. Parents called in for a conference with teacher, counselor, and principal if the essay prompted serious concerns.
4. Only after a student has demonstrate diciplinary actions that pose an immediate bona-fide threat to the school should law enforcement be called in.
I read Allen Lee’s essay. While it is filled with atrocious spelling errors and had some inappropriately violent content, it should not warrant an arrest by law enforcement. I’ve seen far worse from some high school classmates who after 10+ years are law abiding productive citizens (i.e. academics, businesspeople, lawyers).
People without previous diciplinary records such as this writer should be engaged by the school authorities through counseling and mentoring guidance, not the iron-fist of law enforcement authorities. By overreacting, the school authorities are not only treating the symptoms rather than the cause of potential problems, they are also perpetuating further alienation among those who are already disaffected. I doubt this is what school officials had in mind as an end-result of their well-intentioned, but misguided actions.
I apologize for the excessive length of my posting. Am interested to know what you think as I am looking for a dialogue to engage with this issue with others who may not necessarily agree with my perspectives. I look forward to your reply either through a reply posting or an email through the address I provided in the “Post a reply” dialog box.