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How tough is tough enough when it comes to school discipline?

How tough is too tough?

A case pending before the North Carolina Supreme Court raises that question, and pokes some troubling holes into the notion that zero tolerance policies are the best way to maintain law and order in the classroom.

Justices heard arguments last week in a case that stems from a brawl in an eastern North Carolina high school. The January 2008 fight involved students at Southside High in Beaufort County and reportedly lasted for no longer than five minutes.

But the reaction to it was swift and sure. Sheriff's deputies arrested 12 students. School officials eventually suspended seven of them for briefer periods and six others, including the two girls involved in the court case, for the rest of the school year.

No school, no school work

In addition to their suspension for what amounted to five months, the girls were denied access to Beaufort County's alternative school and to any study assistance at home. One of the girls, Jessica Hardy, remained idle over the five months, then enrolled in the alternative school. She also recently gave birth to a baby. The other, Viktoria King, who had been a good student and a cheerleader before the incident, has been accepted to six colleges. But her mother was able to hire a tutor for her during her suspension.

Among the other students suspended for five months, 18-year-old Vernon Mason has neither been employed nor in school for 18 months. Another boy, 18, dropped out and was arrested for theft.

From a legal standpoint, plaintiffs for the girls argue that the school district effectively denied them their basic right to an education. The state Supreme Court ruled in 1997 that North Carolina's Constitution grants each child a right to a "sound basic education."

In 2009, the N.C. Court of Appeals upheld a lower court's decision on the girls' case, ruling that previous decisions about the right to education "were limited to the quality of education in the context of school financing and did not address in any way the subject of school discipline." Whether the Supreme Court agrees with that legal argument remains to be seen.

But the public policy argument seems immediately clear: It does neither the suspended students nor the greater society any good to mete out punishment as sweeping and severe as that in Beaufort County. A lawyer for the school district argued that students who fight temporarily forfeit their right to an education. But what good could possibly come of suspending students for five months plus denying them any access to academic instruction?

Zero tolerance isn't working

When pressed to explain why the girls were banned not only from being in school but from learning altogether, a Beaufort school board member would only say the principal had described the girls' behavior as especially "egregious" and that was good enough for him.

But a number of studies say zero tolerance simply isn't working, as do several notable professional groups. A 2006 American Psychological Association task force called for more "graduated" punishments. Daniel A. Domenech, executive director of the American Association of School Administrators, told The New York Times: "If our primary obligation is to educate kids, then to punish them by excluding them doesn't make sense."

The ripple effects

Beaufort officials say they've gotten tough to ensure "a safe and orderly environment." But other districts have gotten better results with more preventive approaches, including Baltimore and Cleveland, which have abandoned zero tolerance.

Baltimore saw a 39 percent decline in suspensions and Cleveland saw violent incidents decrease by 20 percent over the last two years. Beaufort County, meanwhile, had one of the highest dropout rates in the state last year, and has seen increases in the last two years.

In Guilford County, crime and suspensions fell in 2008-09. At the same time, the dropout rate, which already beats the state average, continued to improve, adding credence to the notion that simply being tough is not enough.

As a state, North Carolina, which ranks fourth in the nation in school suspensions and in the top 10 in dropout rate, may be sabotaging its own economy. "We can't expect to sustain this high of a dropout rate and expect to grow and thrive," said John Dornan, executive director of the N.C. Public School Forum.

Make no mistake, students and teachers deserve a learning environment that is free of threats and disruption.

But there are better ways to accomplish that than simply ushering students out the door.