An educational institution in California is trying to explain why it kicked out a student for supposedly sending emails with a “inappropriate emoji.” The 10-year-old’s parents are suing the school because he was kicked out for sending an email with the words to YNW Melly’s song “Murder on My Mind” and a squirt gun emoji.
The case against Curtis School, which supposedly costs $28,000 to go to, says that the boy and his friend used the song in several emails they sent each other in September. It was shown that the boy sent his friend an email on September 25th that said “I hate you” and had several squirt gun pictures. Another boy joked, “Are you dead yet?” in a second email. The other boy replied, “No why.”
The lawsuit says that the boys were watched while they behaved normally at the Santa Monica Pier for the school’s yearly fair. The boy was pulled out of class on September 30 and asked about the emails by the school’s head for third, fourth, and fifth grades. Law and Crime says that the director allegedly told the boy that as a punishment she would be taking away his tech rights.
But when the boy went to school the next day, Meera Ratnesar, the head of the school, sat down with his family and told them that the student would be kicked out. Experts representing the family say that the emails do not appear to be against any rules set by the school.
In the lawsuit, lawyers Mark M. Hathaway and Jenna E. Parker said, “The emails between the two friends don’t seem to break any student conduct rules, and the squirt gun emoji is available on the Curtis School’s IT system that the students use.” “From what I know and believe, Respondent Ratnesar did not punish Petitioner’s friend in the same way. Petitioner’s friend was not banned from campus or kicked out either.” Respondent’s final choice to kick Petitioner off school and expel him is arbitrary and capricious.
This month, one of the boy’s parents wrote to the school to say that the punishment was “unreasonable” because the emails were based on a song and the boy had always had good grades and had never been in trouble. The email said, “We are very upset that you decided to not let them in because of emails between two classmates who were willing to talk about guns based on song lyrics.”
“We believe that your decision doesn’t take into account the situation in which these communications took place.” “Our son has never been accused of making threats at school,” the email went on. The email was replied to by Ratnesar, who is said to have said that the squirt gun emoji was “threatful” and “a serious infraction we cannot ignore.” Ratnesar stuck to her choice and told the boy’s parents that she would help them find a new school.
The school sent a statement to several news outlets when they heard about the case. “We were sad to hear about the lawsuit, but our top priority is to make sure that all of our students are safe on campus,” the statement said. “We can’t say anything about specific students.”
Article Source: Student expelled from $28K California institution after using ‘inappropriate’ emoji
