Kids These Days:

Last week, the Daily Pilot published a Sounding Off by Gunnar Gooding, a parent at Corona del Mar High School (“Start treating CdM High fairly,” Nov. 10).

Gooding wanted to accomplish two goals. The first was to remind readers that even with the many controversies surrounding the school over the past 18 months, including missing cheerleading funds, the posting of a Facebook video in which three students threatened to rape and kill a fellow student, the staging, unstaging and restaging of a controversial play, the departure of a principal, the forced leave of absence of a teacher subsequent reinstatement of the drama teacher, that CdM is a good school.

The second goal was to “…urge the Pilot to abandon its recent tabloid mentality.” Specifically, Gooding wrote: “Front-page articles on a ‘member stuck in a ring’ or an ugly Facebook incident from 10 months ago are salacious and not worthy of publication in a community newspaper.”

I’m with Gooding on the “member stuck in a ring” story. Must have been a slow news day. And, yes, CdM is a good school — a very good school.

Unfortunately, the Facebook story will be played out for years because it set a precedent that broke the back of any zero-tolerance rules.

The Facebook story confirmed, once and for all, that there is no zero-tolerance policy in the school district. After all, if you cannot expel four students for threatening to rape and kill someone, fellow student or not, who is eligible for expulsion? How about the student who shows up to an after-school event drunk or high? If this person were not a threat to others, perhaps only to himself, and he were caught, should he be expelled? You might make the case that because he broke the rules, yes, he should be expelled.

A few months ago, I might have agreed with you. But now, thanks to three of the Facebook boys being allowed to return and graduate with their class, all bets are off. After all, if we are not going to expel students for threatening bodily harm, how can we expel a student who is high at a football game?

There is no doubt that CdM is a good school. A school does not receive a high national ranking by faking it. There is no doubt that the students there are talented, hardworking and contribute to the community, which leads us to Gooding’s recommendation to the Pilot. Most kids in our high schools are like the students at CdM. They go to school, help out when needed and stay out of trouble. That’s not news, although the Pilot has had much coverage of local kids helping out in the community, including a story with photos just a few days ago. While they may be underappreciated, those mainstream kids are not news. We expect our kids to behave like that.

When they don’t, when they do something stupid and terrible such as creating the Facebook video, it is news. Sometimes, news creates more news, such as a reexamination of zero-tolerance rules. I’m sure Gooding would rather not read any more stories connected to the Facebook video, but the story now has a very long tail. I would not be surprised, for example, to read in the future of a parent challenging his student’s expulsion based on the precedent set at CdM. Gooding also wrote: “Keep in mind there are 2,200 kids at CdM, and to constantly taint the entire student body for the reprehensible actions of these four boys is unfair.”

I agree, but I looked at the news stories in the Pilot and could not find any instance in which the entire student body was tainted. In one thread, I went out of my way to caution against that very thing. But, perception is reality, and there are probably some who think that the entire student population is out of control. It’s a good thing that the guy who got his member caught in the ring was not a teacher at CdM.

STEVE SMITH is a Costa Mesa resident and a freelance writer. Send story ideas to dailypilot@latimes.com .