Suspension of Autistic student who drew bomb lifted

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GREENVILLE, SC (FOX Carolina) -

The suspension of the Upstate student who brought a drawing of a bomb to school has been lifted.

The child's mother said on Wednesday that the suspension of her son, who has special needs, had been lifted after a manifestation hearing. The hearing was to determine if the incident was linked to his disability.

Amy Parham, the boy's mother, said the school determined the episode was connected to the child's disability.

School officials and a student advocate, who is an expert in autism, attended to the two hour meeting.

Parham said her son, Rhett, had made the hand-drawn picture of the bomb during the weekend at home. Parham said her son is a fan of the video game Bomber Man and drew the cartoon-ish like explosive.

Parham said her son took the picture to Hillcrest Middle School, and that's where problems arose.

Parham said she was told that her son showed the picture to some older children, who reported him to school administration. She said her son was suspended indefinitely by the school.

On Wednesday that suspension was lifted.

"They actually reiterated to me they knew he was non-violent," said Parham. "They knew he was not actually having a bomb, creating or making a bomb. But that they could not go with out making an example of him and take some type of action because they were worried about their perception. Perception is actually the word he used. Perception is reality, and parents might think you have a bomb or [might be] violent."

Greenville County Schools spokesman Oby Lyles released this statement on Wednesday saying:

"It is troubling that incomplete and inaccurate information has been shared by the mother about the incident involving her child at Hillcrest Middle School. School districts are prohibited by law from releasing specific student discipline information without parental permission. The district prefers full disclosure of the incident, but the mother has refused our request to allow details about the incident to be released.

The school administration responded appropriately when threatening comments were made, investigated it fully, and acted in accord with applicable laws, policies and procedures to bring this incident to its proper closure."

holly crap im so glad im not in school anymore
all of my notebooks have drawings of guns and bombs
I even drew a detailed implosion device
they would probably charge me with terrorism.
I only graduated in 2010 its crazy seeing the nose dive

NOBODY should be charged with anything under these circumstances. Educators have lost whatever intelligence and sanity they may have ever possessed.

When I was a kid, it was considered 100% normal for little boys to draw pictures of guns, bombs, fighter jets, and tanks. The "alpha-squad," as I called the popular little destined-for-success boys that were my tormentors, spent their free time passing around sheets of notebook paper on which they drew detailed, graphic, bloody pictures of battles.

This was considered normal, healthy, pro-social little boy behavior.

Of course, beating up on "that wierd girl" was also considered normal, healthy, pro-social behavior...

...but it appears that THAT hasn't changed.

We currently live in a paranoid, reactionary, image-obsessed "zero tolerance" culture that is far more concerned with APPEARING to be vigilant than with actually doing anything about problems (probably because it's much easier to figure out how to appear to be vigilant than to figure out what to actually do that might be actually effective, and everyone is running scared). I can empathize with this...

...but I can't ignore the fact that it is harming our children for absolutely no good outcome whatsoever. Bullying and violence in school hasn't improved since we started this BS. All we've done is drive bullying deeper into kids' lives outside of school and hand the bullies one more tool with which to persecute "that wierd kid."

If you think that is bad, I cannot where my pocket watch on the chain due to dress code rules. I had to take the chain off.