The Brits have a better way with words. While we drone on about "sexual harassment" and "zero tolerance" in school, they just inform their students, "No canoodling on campus":
Eight pupils at a Wiltshire secondary school have been suspended after protesting against a ban on "canoodling".
Children at Warneford School in Highworth, were told they were not allowed to kiss, hold hands or hug. Several refused to return to classes last Friday lunchtime in protest [other news reports put the number at 200], and held a rally in the playing field.
Headmaster John Saunders said the eight were suspended for being rude to staff and not because they contravened the "canoodling" rule. He said the ban was aimed at instilling "appropriate behaviour" in pupils. "We were reminding the pupils of a rule that already exists. It was fairly light-hearted," said Mr Saunders.
"We have a school council through which the pupils can express their views, but on this occasion they chose to make a protest in a different way."
The school has around 900 pupils aged between 11 and 16.
A school is within its rights to forbid affectionate physical behavior on school grounds, although suspending students for holding hands is a bit much. If you refuse to go to class, for any reason, you pretty much open yourself up to punishment.
And in the South, we call it "kadoodling" instead.
The protest came after head teacher John Saunders launched a crackdown on kissing, cuddling and holding hands at Highworth Warneford, a mixed comprehensive in Swindon, Wilts.
He wants to end "inappropriate behaviour" at the 900-pupil school, which achieved record GCSE results this summer. But Kim Cullinane, 15, said students intend to petition school governors. She said: "I admit kissing in school is not appropriate but saying we can't touch each other is too much. At 16 you can get married. There is a lot of anger about it."
The marriage age is irrelevant. Just because I'm more than old enough to get married (heh) doesn't mean I could canoodle with my fiance at work if we were both employed by the same company. But I digress.
Fellow pupil Lorna Averies and her boyfriend Alex Apps, both 13, also called the ban on smooching "unfair". Lorna said: "I can understand them not allowing it in lessons but what's wrong with kissing someone at playtime? Maybe the teachers don't want us to have any fun."
And another pupil, Lucy Gray, 15, claimed: "One of my friends was told off for touching a mate."
But some parents have backed the ban and father-of-two Rafu Mirh, 45, said: "It's perfectly reasonable that there is no touching. We have so many under-age pregnancies. They need more discipline."
However, one mother, Mandy Gray, 38, said: "Touching and kissing has been going on for years. They are never going to stop the kids doing that. The staff should concentrate on teaching. There are plenty of worse things like drugs and smoking which they should worry about."
Yes, but if the school tried to ban smoking, it's just as easy to say, "Smoking has been going on for years. They are never going to stop the kids doing that. The staff should concentrate on teaching. There are plenty of worse things..." and so on. Again, I don't think the school is out of line here in trying to enforce appropriate public behavior (if the punishment for infractions is appropriate). I don't know if I'd go so far as to say that school rules affect teenage pregnancy rates, but attitudes like "They're never going to stop kids from fooling around" certainly do.
Posted by kswygert at October 6, 2004 03:48 PM