“This is not a criminal proceeding,” Weinstein says. “We are talking about a code of conduct, which, I want to emphasize, both students and their parents sign before they begin any extracurricular activity, and they’ve all agreed to it.”
The code of conduct specifically prohibits students from consuming alcohol or drugs away from school.
Tenth-grader Justin Janowski says he doesn’t like the policy and thinks parents should be the ones making decisions about how to punish their kids outside of school. But he grudgingly admits the policy is effective.
“I mean, when I was a wrestler and played football like that’s one thing I didn’t want to do was get kicked off the team for getting bad grades. Or I don’t know, get caught smoking cigarettes outside of school, so I didn’t do it,” says Janowksi. “I stayed good.”
Janowski attends high school in a nearby district with the same policy. In the past decade, following the Columbine shooting, schools have suspended students for all sorts of misdeeds away from campus ”” vandalism, minor drug possession or cyber-bullying. Courts have tended to uphold these policies as long as officials can show some connection to school safety. But beyond the legal issues, there is also rigorous debate about whether “zero-tolerance” policies are effective.