School Board to Reconsider Policy, Penalty for Toy Guns

The school system’s zero-tolerance policy on weapons--which calls for suspending any student who brings a gun to campus--will come under fire Tuesday as the school board considers whether to continue including toy guns in the policy.

The issue, which has divided the Simi Valley Unified School District board and alarmed parents, resurfaces as trustees discuss whether cases involving toy guns should be left to the discretion of the principals, among other options.

A second question, whether students who take toy weapons to school should be subject to automatic suspension, will come up at a meeting three weeks later.

The policy should remain intact, with all toy guns, knives or look-alikes included in the same policy as their deadly counterparts, Supt. Mary Beth Wolford said.

Including some toy weapons but excluding others at the discretion of the principals leaves the policy open for individual interpretation, Wolford said.

“I believe in consistency,” she said. “There are very different gradations because what may look clearly like a toy when it’s laid on the table can be very scary when seen in a pocket or sticking out of a backpack.”

Zero tolerance must include toys, she said.

“Our principals want it, and our PTA wants it,” she said.

Since the policy was implemented and the district began suspending students for carrying toy weapons in June 1994, the number of violent incidents on campus has declined, she said.

Wolford’s views put her at odds with at least one member of the school board.

The board’s consideration of the matter Tuesday comes at the request of Trustee Carla Kurachi, who wants to see the policy eased so that incidents involving toy weapons are treated differently from those involving real weapons.

Kurachi, whose fifth-grade son Scott was asked to leave school after he took a plastic gun to campus last year, said it is illegal and contrary to the state Code of Education to suspend a student for taking a toy weapon to school on a first offense,

“I think we are all in agreement that we don’t want kids to bring toy guns to school,” Kurachi said. “The problem is, if they do that, what happens?”

She acknowledged that the discussion Tuesday will focus on what the policy should include, but she said the real issue is how the offending students should be treated.

She said students who take toys to school should be reprimanded before any type of suspension action is taken. Suspension should only be a last resort.

In her son’s case, a school administrator called Kurachi to pick up Scott, stating that the boy would be suspended. Kurachi refused and told the administrator she had misunderstood the district’s zero tolerance policy. The administrator then backed down.

The incident provoked a heated debate at a December school board meeting when parents accused Kurachi of abusing her power as a board member to intervene on her son’s behalf.

Kurachi then asked fellow board members to address the policy on toy guns.

Dawn Moffett, whose seven children attend Simi Valley schools, said she wants the policy to remain unchanged. She does not want the punishment to be eased or the decisions to be left up to the principals.

“It has to be an across-the-board policy,” she said. “It can’t be done case by case.”

She said the students will understand and accept the policy if it is consistent.

“My 6-year-old loves swords and knights,” she said. But when he wanted to take a costume to school, she did not allow it. “I said ‘No, this is a weapon.’ And even at 6 years old, he understands.”

Moffett said her first concern is safety in the schools.

“It’s bad enough out there,” she said. “I don’t want us to have to go to the extreme of metal detectors in schools as Los Angeles Unified has.”