Hey guys, I was wondering if you guys could help me with a school project. I'm suppose to make a debate topic and make a survey. My topic is "Should students have more power in school?". By more power, I mean, the choice of wether to go or not, to vote for principals and figures of authority, to vote on certain rules like dress-codes (being able to wear hats in school, being able to wear certain clothes), also rules like being able to carry CD players in school, cell phones, freedom of speech. That sort of ordeal. Basically, having all the rights that you have outside of school, in school. I need at least 50 people to participate in the survey then I will print this thread out and delete the thread. One thing I ask is please don't post obscenities and start arguing, I need everyone's opinion on the topic not everyone's opinion on eachother's opinions. Thank you for participating and helping me out.

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Yes or No:
Age:
Education Completed:
Gender:
Race:
Reasons:

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Yes or No: Yes
Age:15
Education Completed Does this mean like since i'm asophmore i've completed freshman lol.
Race:white
Reasons:Well students have to learn why shouldn't they be able to maybe listen to their cd players or vote on what they have to wear.

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No.
22.
School education completed, i'm at the university.
male.
German (white, if you wanted that).
When i was at school i wanted more power. But i was a dumb kid. I realized later, that my views of the world, when i was at school, were complete nonsense!!!
CD-players at school are completely unneccesary.
Man, listen to youtr teacher! They're not that stupid!!!!! You really need it later!
BTW: we had no school uniforms, but i think it's not that bad.

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Yes
18
High School
Male
Caucasian
I think the rules about Cd players and Cell phones should be less strict. I mean if a kid is playing music in class then thats one thing, but he just carrys it around so it dosent get stoeln and only listne to it on the bus then why not? And dress cods are lame.... Just because you die your hair or have a chain or baggy pants dosent eman your in a gang....

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Yes or No: No
Age: 15
Education Completed: in 10th grade
Gender: male
Race: white
Reasons: Teenagers need as much structure as humanly possible. I go to a Navy rotc school. Thats pretty tough as it is. But if i can do it, anyone can.


Thats all ive got for 8:45 at night.

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No
Age:18
Education Completed: All of high school, but back for upgrades
Male
Race: Human (if you want the color of my skin then its white)
Reasons: well for one who the hell are you going to call at school, if your sick, and need a ride home then go to the office and call home, CD players i think are ok, just for the computer lab, or walking to or from school, but in the class you learn, and not headbang to Pantera (or whatever) and another thing student council should not be around, because the school does spend alot of money on them, and that money could be more of a benifit to a class full of students than 8 kids dicking around in a room trying to be cool.

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Yes or No: No
Age:17
Education Completed:Yr. 12 (all of high school)
Gender:Male
Race:Black (Stoopid ass fucking question)
Reasons: Kids need people to be able to tell them what to do, thats why adults can tell them what to do. Sure, maybe 5 percent of kids who honestly know whats best for them would benifit from having a say in what goes on in schools, but the other 95 would just fuck it up. I don't have a problem with uniforms either, but they shouldn't be too uncomfortable or inconvenient.

Yes or No: No, but depends upon the weight of regulation already being placed on students.
Age: 26
Education Completed: Bachelor degree
Gender: Male
Race: WASP (anglo)
Reasons: In a liberal society (I'm in Australia BTW), there are basic freedoms, yeah? Freedom to speech however, does not equate to the right to carry a cell phone in school if it's disruptive/used to sell crack/or is otherwise 'abused'. I think students would be afforded more privilege if they would only stop taking everything to an extreme. As this is not easy for a student to do (adolescence, by & large, being the 'rebellious' period of one's life), it is easier to strip away particular privileges to keep them under 'control'. Hope that makes sense.

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Yes or No: No
Age: 19
Education Completed: just finished first year of uni
Gender: Male
Race: i am also confused by the nececity of this question, but, Australian / white
Reasons: There are reasons for everything done in school, uniforms are to limit the ammount of offensive clothing or to reduce teasing of poor kids it is nesacary to have dress codes because throughout every part of your professional career you will be obligated to wear certain things that may or may not be what you would choose to wear, but has to be worn anyway. Voting for principles is a rather stupid idea, as the vote may end up in a popular character rather than a person who would be right for the job, however some voting may be a good thing, such as year level co-ordinators, as they would be chosen from the current faculty, but again there is the problem that many students would not take it to seriously, i know i wouldnt have, from the schools i have been to (all 2 of them) the students go to elect representatives from the students to "get things done" such as implement changes to things suggested, however none of the representatives actually did anything. In relation to carying CD players of cell phones, i don't see an issue with that unless it is disruptive, you go to school to learn not to "headbang to Pantera" as FearFrost said, and at my uni if your phone rings you get instantly kicked out of the leture/tutorial. So provided that the gizmos are off i dont see a problem with them. Overall we have to live with rules and regulations throughout the span of our lives, and most of these rules we cannot do anything about but to put up with them, they have been made for a reason and even if you dont understand that reason, or know what it is, there is (or was) one.



in case anyone couldnt tell, i kicked ass at my yr 12 persuasive peices

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Yes or No: No
Age: 17Education Completed: Year 12
Gender: Male
Race: White
Reasons: Kids are stupid, they need rules, you're there to fucking learn not to use CD players and cell phones.

Thank you guys for participating, those are all good points.
I noticed people didn't get the "Race" question. I'm going by a rubric and the rubric states that I must include an equal amount of people, thus I asked race and sex because I need an equal amount of each. Also, a lot of you emphazised on the use of CD players and cell phones, those are just examples I made, not strictly what this is about.

For example I'll tell you my opinion on this subject:

Yes or No: Yes
Age: 18
Education Completed: S
Gender: Male
Race: Hispanic
Reason: Here in the U.S., a country based on 3 basic freedoms, too many times have our rights as citizens been denied to us by the powers that be. The school system is nothing but a fascist dictatorship in which rights are violated without explanations. If a certain authority figure chooses to, he/she can persecute a student for a senseless reason like a hunch, out of spite, or even discrimination. For example, I have a friend who is white. He had a dispute with a black kid in Phys. Ed. where the black kid tried to choke him just because he (my friend) struck out in baseball. They were both sent to the office and were asked to tell their side of the story. The black guy said that my friend supposedly called him a "Nigger". My friend however, did not. The principal (who is white) didn't care for my friend's side of the story and he got a 3 day suspension and a mandatory "Tolerance" class. I'm not racist at all but it seem like whites baby blacks when it comes to racial issues, but if it's the other way around(if the black kid had called my friend a honky or a cracker), it would be no big deal. Anyways, after he came back from his suspension, the principal told him that he had found out that he did not call him a "Nigger" after all. If my friend would've had the right to a trial with a jury of his peers (like it states in the Bill of Rights), this would not have happened. Instead, he was denied Due Process, proving my point, that this goes far beyond CD players, Cell phones, and Hats. Another issue is freedom of speech. If I were to solicit this debate to the school news paper, it would not be printed. Again, proving my point that all our American rights are stripped from us when we enter the school building. I'm not against regulations, just as long as they're reasonable. And I'm not against education, in fact I'm as far from a hedonist as anyone can be, but in my opinion, vulgar clothing, cell phones, and CD players aren't the things that are disrupting the learning process. The thing that's disrupting the learning proces is the fact that school authority figures try to keep order and keep drugs and violence out of school, yet they force the students who bring all those problems to be in school, when if given the choice they would not go and just become more scum on American streets. With more power the students who do want to be educated will have more control in their education without the hassle of becoming victimized.

P.S. For those who cursed, I would really appreciate it if you went back and edited your posts. AsI said before I will be printing this out for class and we don't have the freedom to say what we want.

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Yes or No: NO!!! GOD NO!!!!
Age: 21
Education Completed: Graduated High School.
Gender: Male
Race: Canadian, Caucasian (that means white).
Reasons: Well for starters, teenagers are ignorant to anything that could possibly benefit them. Eat your vegetables! NO! Don't watch so much TV! NEVER! Go to bed early! I'LL GO TO BED WHEN I WANT! So on and so forth....get the picture??

Especially in school, rules and regulations are there for a reason. Without them kids would run around free, they wouldn't listen to teachers, they would never get any work done, their grades would falter and they would end up being 27 years old still trying to do long division.

I had the delightful pleasure of going through with uniforms on the very last year of my high school experience. Oh what a fun time that was. ALl the students became outraged, everyone protested......yet, the uniforms stayed. And you know what happened? People all the looked the same, we all looked like we belonged to one community.....there weren't as many outcasts and gangs.....things were more peaceful. Girls weren't (or rather, couldn't) wear their 3 sizes too small skirts with the super-tight tank tops (i wish they could have still......but, rules and rules), no one had wigger clothing, or big FUBU shirts dragging down behind their heels. Everything had order and class, and it was nice.

Like someone else mentionned too.....if students voted for authority figures as opposed to an actual school board making these decisions.....we'd have schools with nutjobs running around. Just to make an example, take school presidency elections into mind for a second. Isn't it always the coolest kid who wins? The most popular? The guy with the most cash? The most bling bling busting out of his armany suit he wears on election day? What happens to the REAL candidates that actually have ideas rather than images for the school? Well....they get tossed away into the far library corner, while Joe Smack runs around with half the senior cheerleading team and forgets all about his duties as president.

That's what happens when kids, teenagers, high-school students, have power. For there are many smart ones that want to succeed, there are far more morons that will always outnumber them. And by the time they, the "cool" ones, realize what's happened....it's far too late.

"Flip those burgers John! That fat hoe ain't gonna wait forever for her triple patty cheese melt!" "Yessir...."

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does living in a different country and being schooled in a different system be a reason for me not to give my oppinion?

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No Spikes, on the contrary, it would be a good reason to GIVE your opinion.

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Yes or No: NOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Age: 18
Education: Freshman at University
Race: Russian/Polish/whatever
Gender: male
Reasons: Ha! Reasons...first of all, being in high school (I'm assuming that's what's being debated) shows a great sum of ingorance. You still live at home with mommy and daddy, with all their rules and junk. You haven't lived a real day, the kind of day a parent or single bachelor would have. No, instead you just sit at home rejecting things. You may think you are smart, but you're not. You are just arrogant; all tucked away into you dream world thinking about how much pot you smoked today and how you are going to steal a twenty out of mom's purse.

The reason for not letting younguns have "power" is because they can't be responsible for it. If things don't go their way, they whine and complain. Oh, yeah, letting high school kids judge who their principal is as a reeeal smart idea.
I remember in high school, we did vote for things. But more than half the student body more than likely threw their vote away. Maybe they didn't know any of the candidates, so they just closed their eyes and pointed to a name. Or flat out just didn't vote...like me.
I have never been forced to wear uniforms, but the dress code is surely idiotic. If punk kids want to wear $80.00 pants that flare out, then it's their choice whether they want to wear them, and maybe start a fight because someone stepped on their pants. How pathetic, the way my principals made people sit in the office, so they could call their parents to bring them up another pair. Facial hair wasn't allowed either. I didn't really mind this because when your that young, a little peach fuzz won't get you the chicks. It just makes you look silly. I always brought my cd player to school, but I only listened to it before and after school. I see people listening to them in class all the time, and I just wish that they fail for their rebellious nature. Oh, this is really HI-larious: Some cop wrote me up for wearing a chained wallet! It's NO WHERE in the student dress code that they're not allowed. What can I do?!? When some guy is threatening me, I'll kindly ask him to wait so I can unhook my wallet so I can smack him with my chain!!?!?!?! What an idiot.
So there are flaws and screwups and reasons for and against. Both sides have decent running arguments. But the fact of the matter is, high school kids (exceptioinal few) are too ignorant and arrogant. They seem to think they need all this "power" because they should be in control. Heh, they'll make good Americans though...

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Some simple rules arent gonna make a student change his mind and leanr if he dosent want to. If he wants to give the teacher a hard time he will regardless of any rules. Either way all i know is school sucked and I didnt need to attend junior or senior year seeing as those were just a bunch of b/s colledge prep classes. But if i dropped out and started working immediatly i wouldnt get paid as much simply because i learn all i need for my "profession" and i didnt feel like wasting 2 years.

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Yes or No: Yes
Age: 16
Education Completed: Im a Junior
Gender: Male
Race: White
Reasons: We cant wear hats in my school and its gay.

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Yes or No: no
Age: 17
Education Completed: drop out
Gender: little bit of both
Race: negro/cracka
Reasons: because teenagers are ignorant sacks of shit that can't make good decisions outside of school let alone in school.

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Yes or No: yes
Age:17
Education Completed: starting grade 12
Gender:male
Race: polynesian
Reasons:i think school are good enough that we have to start making the rules up. i wear a uniform and could care less about it. Cell phones is really up to you,they will get stolen if you bring them to my school. just go to school and listen to teachers and you will end up with a job earning money

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Alright guys, thanks for the replies. I gave my speech on tuesday, got an A. This thread can now be closed

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Congrats.

Yes or No: No
Age: 21
Education Completed: kindergarten, basicschool, higher education
Gender: (looks down) mmm well male i suppose
Race: i always like the indy 500 and daytona
Reasons: To be honest, students on the public higher education centres like the dutch ROC ect should have a bit more influence in what school is up to, but no cdplayers?... it depends on it, if it's independend studying i say Yes to cdplayers, it helps me work faster, in classical normal studying, nope, you need to pay attention, and dresscode???? Wich crap ass invented that? you think that if people have the same Uniform on then they look at eachother another way? they don't judge eachoter by there clothing ect? totaly wrong. they will do that anyway, i only think the way teachers are handeling students should be changed, here in Holland teachers seem to be a bunch of pussy's who are already overworked after 2 days of work..





oh ok lol i see it's already been done lol oh well anyway. good for you you got an A

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