<p>Sorry, but i think cutting wires that have to do with communication in a school is more than just "me bad", it can be serious</p>
<p>Somethings are just dangerous...</p>
<p>I wouldn't ground him or anything, i just think an extra day of work is warranted</p>
<p>And double replacing the damaged wires, in case another idjet does the same thing</p>
<p>I think the letter thing would have been funy, I like the car parking thing, etc., but sorry, damage like wire cutting is a safety issue, especially in an emergency</p>
<p>living in earthquake country, and living with a fire at my HS years ago, i take communication at a HS very seriouslly</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I think the key word in that sentence is "kids". Hey, if they were born with good judgment what would they need us for?<<</p>
</blockquote>
<p>I'm with the people who think cutting the wires is dangerous vandalism, pure and simple. </p>
<p>However, I would like to say that I think my high school class had one of the great pranks for all time. We were an all-girls school, and we arranged for each senior girl to swap lives with a senior boy at a local all-boys school. We went to their school, sat in their assigned seating, went to their classes, wore the school ties, etc. Meanwhile the boys showed up in the girls school uniforms and did the same at our school. I was sad at the end of the day, though, because their math teacher was WAY better than ours and I realized I'd missed a lot. One of the teachers, though, was kind of mean and gave a pop quiz on the homework---that he <em>counted</em> towards the boys' grades.</p>
<p>We did make international news; we hit the AP feed and were broadcast as far away as Japan. It helped that one parent let in on the secret in advance was a journalist ;) so there were photos.</p>
<p>Last year's local senior prank ... some kid sent letters to all of the senior parents that their child wasn't going to graduate because they were failing English. The AP English kids (some working for me) knew better, but the kids that might just be not passing were panicked!</p>
<p>One of those senior pranks that hit the newspaper front page (OK it's a small town!). The fallout was pretty bad from that one.</p>
<p>Another senior prank was really very cute. The principal told the class "NO beachballs at graduation". So instead, a week before graduation they filled up his office with inflated beachballs. Clean silly fun!</p>
<p>We did marbles at graduation...every senior when shaking the principals hand, gave him a marble...by the end of the ceremony, his pockets, and all those around him were bulging with marbles, hundreds of them</p>
<p>it was good clean fun</p>
<p>I like the pink flamigos in the halls, that would be rightoues</p>
<p>In retrospect, these two pranks strike me as mean and dangerous. At the time, they were amusing. The first was the releasing of hundreds of crickets in the main hallways. Stampede time - mostly girls! The second was the transparent vegetable oil on the tile hallway floors. Slip and slide without the soft grass.</p>
<p>I like the marbles - I may have to pass that one along...</p>
<p>Okay, marbles funny...not sure about the letters especially if you were the teacher whose home phone number was on the letter. In retrospect what concerns me is that this wasn't a planned prank but an impulse control issue. He just got sick of it and cut the wires. By the way, the Vice principal and the GC both laughed on the phone and told me they also hate the announcements and particularly the blaring music with no volume control. That said it still shows a lack of impulse control. The crickets, by the way, have been done at our school.My DS's other idea was blocking the parking lots with dirt/gravel and I vetoed that one as dangerous, causing accidents. Also, I learned that at least he is telling us what he is up to and not just doing it. One of the real problems seems to be that the AP tests are over and for the seniors the school is like a prison, they are just marking their time....AND that does not excuse his lack of control. Seriously upsetting. By the way, the pig thing has been done to death....</p>
<p>Yeah, policies are crazy today. When some kids were sexually harassing my girlfriend, and I got a full bottle of coke thrown at my face, I almost went crazy. Haha. I'm usually a calm guy but when I go off, it's ugly. </p>
<p>Anyway, I talked to my guidance counselor before I decided on what to do (our school has a minimum 10 day suspension for any fighting--even self defense). She said that our school's policy is ludicrous, and she made sure that I knew that she does not report discipline to colleges. At the end of the day, I decided it wasn't really worth 10 days out to put an idiot in his place...</p>
<p>I like the senior parent letter prank though :(. Maybe I'll use that next year.</p>
<p>A couple of years back - parents received a letter on the day of the prom. The letter was on school stationary with a school envelope and was metered. The letter was signed with a perfect forgery of the headmaster's signature. The letter stated that due to the increased cost of holding a prom, this year's prom was being underwritten by ....</p>
<p>...planned parenthood! - who would have a table set up at the prom and distribute free condoms.
The letter included the unlisted and totally private cell phone number of the headmaster, for parents to call if they had any questions.</p>
<p>Classic!!</p>
<p>The two "A" student pranksters were never identified until graduation, where upon receiving their diplomas they handed the headmaster a package of condoms and a sheaf of school stationary. The headmaster told them they were never suspects.</p>
<p>In telling the story, the headmaster remarked that the school is liberal enough that one senior parent called on the day of the prom to congratulate the school for implementing such a great idea!</p>
<p>My first hs was a three-story building with a basic "H" floorplan (since extended with pods off each arm of the H, but I digress). The Senior AP Chem class made nitrogen tri-iodide and spread it across the third-floor cross corridor, waited for it to dry and then for the end-of-period bell to sound. Today it would probably result in a visit from Homeland Security. NI**3 is tricky to make...not very dangerous but has to be within a certain temperature range to "work" as designed.</p>
<p>To add to the thread with some fun prank listings... a couple of years ago all seniors showed up to school bus stops, which doesn't expect that usage. Buses overloaded - no school that day.</p>
<p>TheDad, ah, nitrogen triiodide.... I nearly spat out my tea. Years ago, someone painted the chair legs of the professor's chair. He had a fondness for leaning back in it and then dropping heavily back onto the front legs to make his point.... </p>
<p>At my H's school, someone made enough shaving cream to fill all the lockers using a fire extinguisher. And put potassium permanganate in the powdered soap dispensers in the girls' locker room. Sadly, it turned out some girls washed their hair with that soap. (Potassium permanganate is a purple crystal that stains skin and hair and takes about two weeks to wear off.)</p>
<p>As a physics teacher with access to the HS lab, I used to make up batches of ammonium tri-iodide which sounds similar to TheDad's formula. The stuff is fine while wet, but as soon as it dries it is so sensitive that I think blowing on it hard would make it explode. I used to spread it (wet) across the classroom floor so that when it dried and the kids came in, every step would produce a little pop and a cloud of purple smoke.</p>
<p>But one day I was in my lab mixing up a batch when it went awry. I'd filter out the solution in filter paper and it would dry from the outside inward. I used to test it my tapping a glass rod on the outer part of the filter paper. When I heard a little pop, I knew that it was starting to dry. That day, I must have waited too long. When I tapped the rod, the whole batch exploded, bringing kids, teachers and administration people running... I walked out of the lab looking like one of those cartoon characters: hair akimbo, glasses askew, and not hearing a thing that was said....</p>
<p>destroying school property is vandalism, and, IMO, your good kid got off easy. He should also have to pay for the electrician/custodian's time to replace them. Yeah, I know, most teenagers can do the wiring themselves, but this is a teachable moment, and destroying public property has REAL costs associated with it, which others (taxpayers) should not have to bear.</p>
<p>The letter idea, however, was pretty funny. LOL</p>