Punishing Imagination and Childish Impulses Won’t Keep Schools Safe

As the calendar turns to August, many parents are starting the annual check of school supply lists, bus routes, and lunch packing routines.  However, some parents might be wondering whether the lunch or school supplies they send with their child might become a disciplinary issue.

Reports are recently surfacing that a Georgia six-year-old was suspended after reportedly biting his sandwich into an “L shape” and pointing it at another student. The student “was previously suspended for pointing a bottle of water at another student and making gun noises and also punished for drawing a pilgrim shooting a turkey … .”

The child’s family argues that the punishment ignores the child’s age and autism which reflects how some school policies can lose sight of common sense. Certainly, expecting a six-year-old autistic child to grasp any complex implications of pointing his “L-shaped sandwich” at another student as he is still learning the difference between imaginative play and real world is absurd. It is also precisely why our society does not prosecute six-year-old children.

This is not a first-of-its kind report, unfortunately. In recent years, schools have made headlines after students faced disciplinary consequences for firearm shaped food items or toys. Recall that a Maryland seven-year-old was suspended for allegedly biting his breakfast pastry into a firearm shape while at school. A five-year old in Pennsylvania was suspended for bringing a Hello Kitty bubblegun to school. And in perhaps the nadir of these accounts, a 3-year-old deaf boy named Hunter was told by his school that signing his own name was a violation of the school district’s “weapons” policy.

While school administrators unquestionably have an important responsibility to assess genuine threats and address disruptive behavior, this necessarily involves the use of sound judgement in distinguishing between serious safety issues and innocent childhood behavior.

The concerns extend beyond isolated incidents and even beyond the classroom. Administrators appear to be treating imagination as suspect, reflecting a broader cultural tendency to view even an imaginary reference to firearms as inherently dangerous. That mindset matters in reinforcing notions that any association with firearms or hunting, even when rooted in innocent childhood play, artwork, or family tradition, should be viewed negatively. A young child drawing a pilgrim hunting a turkey with a firearm simply should not be marked for the record as a safety concern or behavioral issue.

The parents of the Georgia six-year-old were not only baffled by their first grader’s suspension but also noted that the young child is now internalizing the school’s overreaction. “There were definitely times when he would come home and say, ‘I’m a bad kid’ and that’s really hard to hear as a mom,” the boy’s mother told a media outlet. School administrators, more than anyone, should understand that children at that age are still developing their ability to understand abstract concepts, and there is a danger in stigmatizing versus teaching in those moments.

Headlines like these have unfortunately become a predictable aspect of the back-to-school tradition. What they point to is the need for policies grounded in reality rather than symbolic gestures. NRA has pursued such reforms through a variety of means, from grant programs to improve the safety infrastructure of schools to so-called Pop-Tart Bills that give school officials more flexibility in responding to supposed violations of weapons polices posing no risk of harm.

For children’s sake, the best lesson schools can teach is that not every deviation from opaque bureaucratic dictates deserves harsh punishment and that common sense can be an indispensable part of education. Unfortunately, many of America’s schools are still a long way off from learning even that elementary lesson.