Florida Eighth-Grader Gets Detention For Hugging

CBS Tampa

OVIEDO, Fla. (CBS Tampa)– An eighth-grader in Florida got detention for hugging friends before school, according to WKMG.

“I just like hugged them. It was literally for a second,” Ella, an eighth-grade student at Jackson Heights Middle School, told the station.  

The school district bans “inappropriate touching,” but that’s left for interpretation for each principal. Jackson Heights banned hugging altogether this year, a move some parents find excessive.

“I do not feel that this ‘no hugging, holding hands, arm-linking’ would be considered inappropriate touching,” Kathy Fishbough, Ella’s mother, said.

The district says students are given detentions after repeatedly breaking the code of conduct. The student’s mother said Ella was given a warning last month when the same boy from the “hug” put his hand on her head.

“I do think about inappropriate touching and boys and girls of this age having feelings for one another, but that’s not what we’re dealing with here. And if administration can’t tell the difference between a friendly, ‘How are you doing’ hug and an inappropriate hug, then I think we have another big problem,” said Fishbough.

The incident now has families wondering if the district’s policy may be taken too far by some schools.

“I did ask the principal, if something happened in our family, and she needed to console her cousin or her cousin wanted to console her, would she get in trouble? She said, ‘Yes, ma’am. She would get a PDA,” Fishbough told WKMG.

http://tampa.cbslocal.com/2015/11/03/florida-eighth-grader-gets-detention-for-hugging/

4 thoughts on “Florida Eighth-Grader Gets Detention For Hugging

  1. If he’s in the eighth grade, he’s big enough to smash the principal’s head with a bat, and that’s what he should have done.

    I don’t want to hear him cry about his detention, and no one else does, either. A cracked skull is the only thing anyone is going to listen to these days.

  2. “… if administration can’t tell the difference between a friendly, ‘How are you doing’ hug and an inappropriate hug, then I think we have another big problem,”

    They can tell the difference, alright. The difference is immaterial to them.

    This is about control.

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