News Staff Reporter
Students who missed the Martin Luther King Jr. Day Special Program were condemned to Saturday detention instead of the Sunday D with which they would generally be punished for skipping a Choate Special Program. The change in disciplinary action was announced by Dean of Students John Ford.
Though he said that he “[could not ever] imagine...making a decision entirely on my own,” Mr. Ford said he would “take full responsibility for [the decision].”
Many of these students thought this sudden alteration of punishment severity was inequitable. However, most of the students who were present at the program seemed apathetic on the question. “They got to sleep in and we didn’t,” remarked Taylor Visoski ‘09, a freshman who thought the punishment was adequate.
The deans seemed to share Taylor’s opinion although for perhaps slightly different reasons. Even Maggie Carter ‘06, a senior who skipped the program, understood its importance. “They put in a lot of effort to make these programs work, to get the people to come so they expect the kids to come and respect that they have commitments,” she said, “It was the only commitment that day, it was a good program, it was important. We should have gone.”
Mr. Ford explained the change in punishment: “We don’t treat MLK Day as simply a day off from school. Students missed a special program, a program which involved an invited guest and a performance commemorating a day during which all us should take some time to think about the man, Martin Luther King, who really put the question of race relations in the mainstream of 20th century American thinking, politics, and government.” He continued, “We were disappointed that some of our students decided that they’d rather just stay in bed. And should students choose in the future to similarly skip special programs, similar punishments will result.”
“At first I was outraged,” said Lauren Citrome ‘06 after finding out her punishment. Scores of sixth formers had been rewarded just a week earlier with “get out of Sunday D free” passes for turning in their yearbook pages early and they planned to use these passes for the MLK Special Program. “I thought it was obvious that you would get a Sunday D for skipping a program, and I had planned on using [the pass] to get off the hook for skipping MLK,” continued Lauren. “I think it was just sleazy because I think they knew that kids were going to skip. I guess more kids skipped than were expected so I ended up with a Saturday D and I thought I would just get away with it,” ranted Maggie. “They should have told us! They should have at least warned us because half of the kids on the list wouldn’t have skipped.” Lauren agreed, saying, “Shouldn’t punishment specifications be public knowledge? Isn’t that the purpose of the school’s handbook?”
When asked why students were not informed of the punishment beforehand, Mr. Ford replied that “as far as I know, no student asked, and it didn’t occur to us that so many people would deliberately skip the program.”
Mr. Ford also explained that “it disappoints [him]” to hear that many students would not have skipped the program if they had been informed of the punishment before. “I know our students are better than that – as far as I’m concerned this isn’t about the punishment; it’s about what the students skipped.”
Maggie went on to comment on the reasons for instigating the more severe punishment. “If they hadn’t changed it to a non-academic cut [which they did], half of the seniors that skipped would have been on bounds or restriction because it would have been their second cut this term.” According to Maggie, the deans changed the punishment in light of this realization.
Indeed, some students have said privately that Ford’s actions amounted to Choate’s own version of ex post facto, an unconstitutionality in America’s legal system.
Velma Dean, the fourth form girls’ dean, felt that the amount of students who already had Sunday detention contributed to the decision to penalize the students with Saturday D instead. “It may have been mostly because of sheer numbers,” commented Ms. Dean. She elucidated that there were 142 students who showed up for Sunday D three weeks ago and she expects the numbers to continue to overflow the St. John building in weeks to come. “That alone would be a good reason to send some students who have Sunday D to Saturday D,” she said.
However, Mr. Ford said that “it was [more] a response to what the students were skipping, our school’s celebration of Martin Luther King Day.”
