So apparently, West Virginia outlawed paddling and other forms of corporal punishment in their schools in 1994. But wait for it… Because the youth of today are deemed to be so damn disrespectful, one of the state’s lawmakers has proposed legislation to bring back paddling to classrooms. What I find even more distressing is that this legislator also moonlights as a substitute teacher.

The Charleston Daily Mail offered an astonishing editorial about the paddling proposal:

West Virginia has a part-time legislature made up of people who have jobs back home. They are supposed to bring their life experiences to the Capitol with them.

Delegate Brian Savilla, R-Putnam, did just that when he proposed bringing corporal punishment back to West Virginia. He is a substitute teacher.

The state banned the paddling of students in 1994.

“I firmly believe it’s led to a lack of respect,” Savilla said.

“Back when we had paddling, you did have instances, but they were on a smaller scale. When there was paddling, there was more discipline in school, and the system itself was more structured.”

There is no question that today’s youths are less respectful of authority and schools than students a generation ago.

The reasons are many – the breakdown of the family is a huge reason – but the brunt of dealing with the consequences is borne by teachers.

In removing corporal punishment from the toolbox the teacher has to maintain discipline in the classroom, the Legislature failed to replace that tool. Savilla said detention, suspension and even expulsion have failed to work.

It is like trying to feed a child who is not hungry and keeps throwing bowl after bowl of food on the floor.

Part of the problem is state courts, which maintain that education is a “right,” and have forced state officials to provide an education to a student no matter how bad his behavior may be.

Students expelled for disrupting school are now “entitled” to education, at taxpayers’ expense, in an alternative setting.

Taxpayers can’t afford that.

Schools aren’t broken. Society is.

Somehow, society must communicate, through real consequences, the fact that with “rights” come corresponding responsibilities – in this case, to respectful behavior in school.

Otherwise, the “right” to education, which kids undervalue, is forfeited.

Parents who knew their children could lose the right to attend public schools would do a better job of working with school officials.

Savilla’s proposal may go nowhere, but he has brought attention to a serious problem. Serious minds in the House and the Senate should take it up.

Orderly schools would make things easier for teachers, bring up test scores, and set more children on a productive path.

The entitlement philosophy is not accomplishing that.

Let me get this straight, the newspaper is suggesting that a student’s “bad behavior” should disqualify him/her from attaining an education through public schooling. Presumably, the editorial board is suggesting that students who “act up” should be shipped to private schools. Yet we know that the students who are disproportionately targeted by school disciplinary policies are poor, male and of color. Taken to its logical conclusion, these students once banned from attending public schools would have to find private schools to accommodate them. Can we guess about the likelihood that they would continue their education? This would lead to an increased number of school dropouts who had essentially been barred from accessing an affordable education. How early would we begin to kick children out of public schoTax payers in West Virginia would eventually be left holding the bag for a much more expensive option – they would be left paying thousands of dollars more to incarcerate these students in the future. Because closing off the path to education insures that you are opening the door to future incarceration.