> This confuses me because at my high school the kids who did anything like this would be sent to the principal's office, then disciplined with on-campus or at-home suspension, then eventual expulsion where they'd land at the school for bad kids.

We had "crossword puzzle school", where the soon-to-be-dropouts were sent. The only work was apparently in the form of crossword puzzles, all day, every day. You usually only got sent here if you were actually arrested by the police for something like drugs or violence, preferably on school grounds.

Back in my normal school, sometimes you got sent to the principal's office. Sometimes you get in-school or home suspension. But eventually, you were back in class. I don't actually ever recall hearing of someone getting expelled from the school system—I'm not even sure that was legal. I assumed that's because, at least in my state, education was required for all students under a certain age (apparently even if that "education" was crossword puzzles, or worse, in a juvenile prison).

Anyway, you could only be punished you if you got caught. Students were very good at not getting caught. A mentality of "us against them" took hold in many cases, where "them" was the staff. For example, I once brought some contraband to school in my backpack. An administrator found out about it, dropped into my class, called me up in front of the class and asked me about it. I lied. The administrator then went to my desk and searched my backpack. To my surprise, there was no contraband inside. He suspected that I had passed it to another friend of mine, so he searched that person. Nothing. The administrator searched several more people in class, but he came up empty. No one was ever punished.

I found out afterwards that, while the administrator was interrogating me, another student removed the contraband from my backpack. Students then proceeded to quietly pass the objects around the classroom, from student to student, so that they wouldn't be found. They returned the items to me when the administrator left, and did so in full view of the teacher. Many of the people who helped me were acquaintances at best. I wasn't even very popular—some of the people who helped me frequently beat me up.

When a teacher sends one student to the office, the student is punished. I strongly suspect that, if a teacher tried to send 50% of their students to the principal, the teacher would be punished.

> I like how you wonder how you can educate children without making them resent it like it's the systems fault for creating a boring classroom that therefore made you terrorize some poor teacher when really you were all horrible bullies to the teachers because you chose to be that way.

Let me start by saying that, if I could do my school days over again knowing what I know now, I would act very differently. I often behaved like a rude idiot, squandering more opportunities and days than I care to count now. I hope I have become a better person since then.

I'll also point out that several of the people I went to school with died before graduating high school (suicide, drunk or otherwise impaired driving accidents, overdose, etc.).

I left my first reply because I think many people grew up in schools where my stories seem ludicrous, and they can't imagine why a teacher's interview would put so much emphasis on "classroom control". Having seen or heard first-hand accounts of similarly bad behavior in so many classes and schools, I thought some concrete examples of what can happen without classroom control might be illustrative. My school might have been a bit below average in terms of student behavior, but I don't even think we were the worst school in my district.

Ultimately, I think you are trying to say that it is not the school's responsibility to make students behave and accept education, but rather the students' responsibility not to misbehave and disrupt school? If so, I understand the sentiment, but I'm not seeing how it leads to any practical solutions. Some students just don't care. I'm just not sure that's a reasonable demand of a child's brain, particularly when that child might be hungry and scared.

I express a desire for educators to find ways to engage students and make schools welcoming, exciting places to be because that's what I wish my schools could have been instead of the dismal, often terrifying places they were. I wish others would have an easier time than me in school, and as a result that they come out better than I am.

Could I have behaved better? Yes, absolutely. My question is that, if you accept that some students don't see why they should behave differently, how do you change their minds?