LANSING, Mich. (Michigan News Source) – A first grader in a Northern Michigan school runs down the hallway, kicking over trash cans and ripping photos off the wall. Another elementary school student comes around the corner, slips on the trash and hits her head on the floor after she falls. The problematic first grader, a repeat offender who caused the disturbance, was finally sent home for a few days for his behavior after the girl was injured. But that just ended up being a nice vacation for him and then he’s let back into the school a few days later. He continues to be an ongoing headache for the school.

MORE NEWS: Middle East Expert: Americans ‘Lulled’ Into False Sense of Security on Terrorism

An emotionally disturbed third grader in the same elementary school kicks the doors of classrooms as she runs down a hallway and screams at teachers and staff. And the teachers just watch. When the girl’s mother is called, it takes her hours to show up to pick up her daughter and nothing changes in the days or weeks following because the child’s home life is the crux of the problem and it’s where she learns, in addition to what she’s learning at the school, that she can do whatever she wants.

These incidents were described to Michigan News Source on the condition of anonymity because the teachers and staff in schools in Michigan are often helpless to do anything about the disturbing behaviors happening in their schools – and they can face consequences of their own if they attempt to intervene.

This bad behavior only gets worse as the students progress to middle school, junior high and high school. Even students who aren’t involved in violent behavior can still be destructive to the schools. Bathrooms are one of their favorite areas of vandalism, stuffing food and other items down toilets and doing other damaging things that result in a lot of time and money to fix and replace school lockers, desks, bathrooms, walls, classroom supplies and equipment.

The rules that govern discipline at Michigan schools are handed down through state law and recommendations of the Board of Education. The state government, for the most part, doesn’t believe in discipline. In fact, the Michigan State Board of Education’s “Model Code of Student Conduct 2019” says that they “strongly urge school districts to adopt practices that allow educators to address disciplinary matters as opportunities for learning instead of punishment.” They go on to encourage schools to use “discretion to reserve suspension and expulsion for only the most serious offenses such as those infractions required by law and deemed absolutely necessary.”

The State Board allows for a local or intermediate school district or a public school academy to develop and implement a “code of student conduct” in which the schools “shall enforce its provisions with regard to pupil misconduct in a classroom, elsewhere on school premises, on a school bus or other school-related vehicle, or at a school sponsored activity or even whether or not it is held on school premises.”

A list of actions available to take when students are involved in behavioral problems in one Michigan school is outlined in a handbook that includes the code of conduct for their students. Listed in the handbook is a requirement that bad behavior on a school bus must include three infractions before there is any suspension involved. These infractions include not remaining seated, fighting, hitting, kicking, bad language, not adhering to safety rules outside of the bus, sticking body parts outside of the bus and more.

Responses to other infractions inside of this school regarding code of conduct issues includes wading through a plethora of “consequences” that are available to teachers and administrators. Although the responses can ultimately include suspensions and expulsion, other measures are often chosen instead and used time after time including warnings, problem solving conferences, “time outs,” in school suspensions, after school detentions and restorative practices. Restorative practices are defined as “Practices that emphasize repairing the harm to the victim and the school community caused by a pupil’s misconduct. It gives an opportunity for the offender to accept responsibility for the harm caused. Consequences shall be agreed upon by all participants.”

MORE NEWS: ‘Very Strange’ UM Lab Case Ends With Guilty Plea and Immediate Deportation

The mostly hands-off and words-off approach to discipline in our schools could be creating future monsters that society will have to deal with. And instead of looking at events like school shootings as a behavioral or emotional result of not disciplining kids or giving them consequences for their actions, Michigan politicians and others in the rest of the country turn to gun control legislation instead.

But gun control won’t solve the real problem. Many teachers believe that children are being raised by parents and schools who refuse to discipline bad behavior. And what is going on in America’s schools should alarm everyone.

The current political disagreements being debated right now concerning schools include the important issues of CRT (critical race theory), gender issues and the kinds of books allowed in school libraries. But what is being ignored, and is just as important if not more important, is the lack discipline of the problematic children in schools across America.

On the website boredteachers,com which allowed teachers a platform for educators to escape and find humor in the frustration and exhaustion that comes with the profession of teaching, they say, “Consider, if you will, the picture: Students running around choking other students. Students throwing things at the teacher. Kids fist fighting in the hallways. Teenagers screaming at the top of their lungs and running out of the room when the teacher approaches. They are out of control.”

They go on to say what teachers and staff members of schools all over the country know. They explain, “These outrageous behaviors aren’t unique or rare. They have increased since the pandemic, and teachers don’t know if they can take it any longer. Some aren’t. They refuse to put themselves or other students in harm’s way. They no longer will tolerate in-your-face disrespect. Teachers are quitting. They are retiring early. THEY ARE RUNNING AWAY…..  And FAST.  In fact, survey data from November of 2020 showed that one in four were thinking of quitting at the end of the 20-21 school year. Who can blame us?”

They point to the reasons for this bad behavior as being partly COVID-19 related. They cite student trauma because a non-normal two years of schooling; an increase in screen time; and their parents modeling disrespect.

The website says that “teaching only the curriculum and not addressing social skills is a tad bit difficult when we have kids hiding under tables, threatening other students with a pair of scissors and calling the teacher a ‘B.’”

The truth is, pandemic or not, the behavior of students in schools has been getting worse and often parallels the crime problem going on in the country. With a lack of consequences for actions, there aren’t many deterrents for bad or violent behavior by children or adults.

In the case of schools, without a zero-tolerance policy for certain behaviors, and administrators who are okay with sending “bad” students back into the classrooms over and over again, they are telling ALL the students that they can do what they want. That creates an atmosphere of staff and teachers who are fearful of their students and fearful of intervening in bad situations because they might lose their jobs. So they don’t address the bad behavior. They watch it happen.

On the flip side, other teachers end up paying way too much attention to the “special” students, rewarding their bad behavior with extra time and attention while the other students are robbed of the time and education they are supposed to receive.

Utilizing mental health professionals and implementing more strict guidelines for student behavior are a few helpful solutions to these problems. And as the Bored Teacher website says, “Administrators need to have zero-tolerance policies for violent outbursts and step in and advise parents of their options for mental and behavioral help for their children.” Additional aides in the classroom and lunchroom are also needed but with staff shortages in Michigan schools, this often doesn’t happen.

Out of control classrooms are not just a Michigan problem though.

In New Jersey at the end of February, hundreds of students at a high school walked out of class to protest the stabbing of a student by an 11-year-old boy. The students blame the school district’s alleged “inaction of violence” for the stabbing and demanded updated school safety protocols.

In Fresno, California, parents went to a school board meeting and begged for help. They said their school was “on fire” because of violence, profanity, misbehavior and no consequences.

In Hudson, New York, CBS Channel 6 has been getting tips from parents about violent fights in their school district after seeing some of them on social media. They say that the school district needs to regain control over the students and they are worried about their kids.

And perhaps, most appalling of all, was the recent shooting of a teacher in Virginia by a six-year-old boy. The boy had stolen his mother’s gun and brought it to school to target his teacher. He shot her at point-blank range but he won’t be criminally charged. In fact, there has been no news of any kind of consequences that he will receive. The shooting was not some isolated incident – the six-year-old has a history of what the The Daily Mail described as “disturbing behavior.”

The disturbing behavior of the six-year-old involved problematic interactions with teachers, staff and other students. He has been depicted as a student who breaks things, curses at people, bullies and harasses other kids, he whipped his belt at students and he choked another teacher until she couldn’t breathe. The choking incident was described as the student coming up “behind her (teacher) as she sat in a chair in front of the class, locked forearms in front of her neck and pulled back and down, hard.” A teaching assistant had to pull the boy off her.

The Daily Mail says the teacher has requested anonymity because she is afraid of possible retaliation from the school district. That is what the staff and teachers face in America’s schools now. No support, no help, no answers for the problems going on in their schools that are putting both staff and other students in jeopardy.

The teacher who was choked told the Associated Press, “I didn’t feel safe the rest of the year because I knew if they (school) didn’t protect me when he choked me and I couldn’t breathe, then they wouldn’t protect me, my kids or my colleagues if he did something not as harmful.”

Unfortunately, that is the harsh reality in many of our schools today. The schools, just like the criminal justice system, will bend over backwards to protect the ones who disregard the rules and are a danger to others – and they will leave the innocents to fend for themselves.