School District Reverses Suspension of Student, 6, Who Pointed Finger and Said 'Pow'
The parents of a Washington, D.C., area first-grader who was suspended for a day by his elementary school for reportedly pointing his finger as if it was a gun and saying “pow” have won a swift resolution of an administrative appeal.
Attorney Robin Ficker, who represents the unidentified family, tells the Washington Post the family learned late Thursday that Montgomery County school leaders had agreed to expunge the child’s record in response to the appeal he filed the previous day.
Both parents, Ficker said, were concerned that what the school district inaccurately described in a letter as a threat by their child “to shoot a student” could potentially create serious problems for him if it remained on his disciplinary record. “He’s going to be in that school system 12 years, and those words are very damning.”
The 6-year-old is a student at Roscoe Nix Elementary School in Silver Spring, Md.
A spokesman for the school district declined to comment when contacted by the newspaper. The child’s suspension followed a stunning massacre of first-graders and others at an elementary school in Connecticut last month, which likely heightened sensitivities by school officials to perceived threats of violence, the Post notes.
