School sees science project of 11-year-old as threat — This is incredible. Exactly how stupid are these people? No wonder the kids learn nothing in California schools.
Students were evacuated from Millennial Tech Magnet Middle School in the Chollas View neighborhood Friday afternoon after an 11-year-old student brought a personal science project that he had been making at home to school, authorities said.
Maurice Luque, spokesman for the San Diego Fire-Rescue Department, said the student had been making the device in his home garage. A vice principal saw the student showing it to other students at school about 11:40 a.m. Friday and was concerned that it might be harmful, and San Diego police were notified.
The school, which has about 440 students in grades 6 to 8 and emphasizes technology skills, was initially put on lockdown while authorities responded.
Luque said the project was made of an empty half-liter Gatorade bottle with some wires and other electrical components attached. There was no substance inside.
When police and the Metro Arson Strike Team responded, they also found electrical components in the student’s backpack, Luque said. After talking to the student, it was decided about 1 p.m. to evacuate the school as a precaution while the item was examined. Students were escorted to a nearby playing field, and parents were called and told they could come pick up their children.
A MAST robot took pictures of the device and X-rays were evaluated. About 3 p.m., the device was determined to be harmless, Luque said. Luque said the project was intended to be a type of motion-detector device.
Found by Kevin Terminella via Twitter.
We have hired ignoramuses to take care of us
and manage our schools and government.
There is no place for us who are not paranoid
any more.
“Exactly how stupid are these people? No wonder the kids learn nothing in California schools.”
You mean the principal, the police and the bomb squad. It’s just too bad JCD wasn’t there to set them all straight.
“When police and the Metro Arson Strike Team responded, they also found electrical components in the student’s backpack, Luque said. After talking to the student, it was decided about 1 p.m. to evacuate the school as a precaution while the item was examined.”
RBG
#17, Did that, too. Great fun.
I also used to make my own rocket fuel out of pot-nit and powdered sugar, over a bunson stove. You heat it it all until it is a type of putty. Shove it into a used model rocket motor with a firecracker fuse. Worked great!
I am not sure you could even get the pot-nit anymore. I originally bought it at the local drug store in a big plastic bottle labeled Saltpetre.
Paranoia! Who says we don’t manufacture anything in this country anymore???
So why don’t kids want to go into science and engineering in this country?
#9 gets my vote and I stopped reading. If you are that ignorant about tech you don’t need to be at a school trying to teach tech because you have no clue.
If this is a tech school the kids should be hauling around projects with wires all the time.
In fact the simple failure to get the teacher to come take a look suggests this person is clueless in more than one way.
A wild over reaction after talking to the student and teacher would have been to take the thing outside and let the bomb squad look it over. Once outside even if the bottle had been full of hydrogen and oxygen the boom wouldn’t have done any damage.
Geez, you’d think at least the bomb squad would know something about that. Any chance you could volunteer to help them out?
RBG
I think its funny that the school officials suggest that the student and parents “seek counseling”. For what? Learning how to live in a society run by fuktards?
It’s a head-scratcher, all right.
I had read somewhere else the authorities were afraid the bottle contained dihydrogen monoxide and you know how dangerous that can be.
Excellent work by the principal – promoting wireless technology.
So let’s bring this back to partisan wrangling:
Which political party has worked the hardest to install a climate of constant fear in the country?
Anyone? Bueller?
I had a chemistry teacher in high school who made up what was called flypaper. When he mixed it up it would be wet and he would put small grains of the substance on small strips of paper. Once the substance dried, the claim was that a fly landing on it would cause it told detonate.
The teacher would proceed to teach us chemistry and occasionally use a yardstick to touch the strips of paper. Just a lite touch would result in a bang as loud as a gunshot. Amazingly, the principal and vice-principal never bothered him about this or some of the really dangerous stuff he did in class.
So I guess making the model volcano is no good anymore?
In most cases, letting the teacher know ahead of time what you are making might prevent such problems before they arise.
Of course, that would restrict projects such as nuclear baby irridators, an intersteller hyper-fusion drive, and a Dick Cheney Confessional. But I’m sure that 11 and 12 y/o minds can come up with other ideas.
@Phydeau:
Which party says that we should put our trust in the public school system?
Remember – Columbine happened long before Bush took office. That’s the event that ramped up all the “zero tolerance” nonsense.