Thousands rally behind teen girl cuffed, expelled in harmless 'explosion' Controversial decisions by officials in Florida to arrest, charge and expel from school a teenage girl (and model student) for causing a totally harmless "explosion" by mixing household products in a plastic bottle are attracting widespread condemnation. Kiera Wilmot, 16, a student at Bartow High School in Florida, is no …
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School website below..
http://www.bartowhighschool.com
Anyone feel the need to email the Principal whos email is on the main page and tell him to grow up and let kids be kids.... I mean come on.. This is america, where they give a 5 year old a gun so he can shoot his little sister, but a kid a school follows a few youtube vids in the hope something funny with happen gets this treatment... some people need to get a grip on life.
I did that inadvertently once as a teenager. Power supply for an 807 PA on my HF transmitter. Forgot to allow the 1.4 multiplier for the big electrolytic's voltage rating. Wondered what the sizzling noise was - and why the DC voltage was steadily dropping. Luckily the capacitor's metal container channelled the steam powered paper and aluminium foil vertically. Smeared the wall a few inches in front of my head.
Americans understand guns, they love guns, guns are safe... a lot of them do not understand science, it is scary and contradicts their bibles.
*speaking as an American and a Floridian (sadly I chose to become an American but hey guns are pretty darn cool, science is also cool, and so are bowties, and fez)
The zero tolerance thing is stupid, and down there they do like the throw the book at certain people because I think they are bored, yet others get away with heinous things.
Daniel tosh said it best about Florida - "it is hot flat and dumb"
really? that's interesting because there is a whole bunch of them down trying to get creationism in schools and evolution banned, and the right to take their guns anywhere, and they also think vaccinating your child is bad too... I have lived in the Midwest and now the south there is a massive difference between the too they are worlds apart... remember a woman cannot get pregnant if she does not want to...and the earth is 6000 years old yes those are the same nutters who do not want any legislation on guns because it is their right... at least in the Midwest they attempt to use facts.
Who claimed to have blown the windows out of the science lab in his previous school.
In my lessons he managed to set fire to the top of the fume cupboard.
And there was the wonderful "OH SHIT THAT'S THE WRONG COLOUR" incident when dropping a piece from the bottle marked Sodium into the beaker of water. Lilac is such a lovely colour and no one died when it part of the experiment exploded several feet above the desk.
MY high school chemistry teacher showed us the thermite reaction.
How do you think he set fire to the fume cupboard.
No1 son was jutted when he heard that when I went to school the termite reaction was done live in the classroom. These days they're boring and watch a video, and they could find far more interesting videos on YouTube.
Mine had us demonstrating the thermite reaction in pairs throught the lab, alkanes involved an overzealous sampling of methane from a gas tap next to a lit spill creating a jet of flame across the lab, toluene and a nitrating mix with insufficient cooling resulted in a rather careful but rapid exit for the class, sodium was a lovely chrysanthemum shaped bloom on the ceiling tiles and some missing eyebrows, the list goes on but this was prior to COSHH. We learned from our mistakes and everyone knew what to do in cases of emergency as they occurred about once a fortnight. Minor injuries, a few interesting scars and a healthy respect for what we were dealing with was the result.
Outside of school included experimentation in to the feasibility of explosive tipped hollow point air rifle rounds amongst many other less sane projects.
"alkanes involved an overzealous sampling of methane from a gas tap next to a lit spill creating a jet of flame across the lab, toluene and a nitrating mix with insufficient cooling resulted in a rather careful but rapid exit for the class".
Oh dear - this does take me back....
What was the trick of introducing an airlock into a bunsen that would eventually extinguish someone else's flame?
An experiment with ether in a beaker. The vapour gradually crept invisibly across the bench until it reached a neighbour's lit bunsen - just like a fuse trail.
Heating toluene - caught fire and large oily black particles drifted over every surface in the lab.
One lad spilled a beaker of an acidic reaction on his smart nylon lab coat which just morphed into a white plastic mess. Old fashioned cotton ones were much safer.
Several times chemistry teachers stood in front of their desk to lecture the class. Then a smell of burning announced a large brown streak up the back of their jacket from the always lit bunsen on their bench.
The VIth Form making chromium dichromate - the final step was allowing the excess water to slowly evaporate over several days. Just when it was expected to be dry the beaker was mysteriously filled with water. Apparently the senior Chemistry master had lost his nerve over what can spontaneously happen when it gets very dry.
The VIth Form trying to making nylon by passing nitrogen over something (amide?) heated in a tube. A lad's father worked for BOC and had arranged for a large cylinder of nitrogen to be delivered. A piece of rope round a tall tap kept it upright against the bench. As the experiment started a foul gas came out of the rubber tube attached to the end of the apparatus. Quick thinking stuffed the tube end down the sink waste hole - problem solved. This was in the small prep room - the next thing was a class being evacuated from the main lab as the fumes re-emerged from all their sinks. It never did produce any nylon though - only the "nylon rope trick" did that.
Our junior Chemistry teacher was sensible. We did the thermite exothermic reaction demonstration on the lawn outside the lab. The only problem was that his windbreak scrum of a class of 13 year olds kept skittering away every time he applied the match flame to the magnesium. He eventually coaxed the scrum and match to produce the impressive results with a large cloud of white smoke.
He also lined us up against the lab's side wall for safety - and wrapped the large whisky bottle in his lab coat - before igniting a coalgas/air flame the length of the room.
He, and the next junior Chemistry teacher, both managed to split a pneumatic trough into two sides and a bottom. The timid small piece of sodium didn't turn affect the litmus paper - so a larger lump was used. Much fizzing and sparks followed by a loud bang - and the classroom echoed with boyish cheers.
Judging by these comments there seem to be certain initiation rites for new Chemistry teachers.
" The timid small piece of sodium didn't turn affect the litmus paper - so a larger lump was used. Much fizzing and sparks followed by a loud bang - and the classroom echoed with boyish cheers."
My chem teacher demonstrated the sodium-water reaction in front of us on an overhead projector so we could all see. He'd have had us doing it in pairs (the usual arrangement, I presume so that there was some to help the vicitim) but the school couldn't afford it. The small piece of rather elderly sodium failed to impress so he fished it out, scraped the oxidisation and wax off with his thumb nail and tossed it back in. MUCH more impressive.
Supposedly they watch videos now. We seem to be turning into a society that watches things rather than doing them. Like porn and cooking...
" These days they're boring and watch a video, "
On a rare School reunion about ten years ago the old boys from the 1960s had a guided tour round the old campus labs and workshops.
The Chemistry lab initially looked much the same - with the roller blackboard behind the teacher's large podium bench with a sink and bunsen. However the rows of pupils' benches facing the teacher had been replaced by little pod desks that the kids sat round. There were no sinks or bunsens for the kids - and only a quarter of them could watch a teacher's demonstration without turning round. No fume cupboards, no reagent shelves, and no periodic charts on the wall. How uninspiring it all appeared.
The only specialist room that hadn't really changed was the gym. However there was much speculation as to whether the kids were allowed to climb to the high ceiling on the ropes. The horizontal beams were probably not lowered from the ceiling very often either. They had added a weights area - which seemed to effectively prevent the efficient circulation of a class through the showers after PE/games. On the other hand a quick spray of Lynx seems to be all that is required these days. Our fathers had the modern pithead showers - although Friday night at home still needed the tin bath to be fetched from the coalshed. After using a cold hose in the old school - the hot showers in the new school were a luxury that made up for no underwear, thermal or otherwise, while playing on a frozen football pitch.
Fizzy pop and mint - Check
Buying French bangers on school trips, coring an apple, inserting the banger to make an apple grenade - Check
Deodorant can on top of a fire (inside a metal bin so it could only go up) - Check
Unopened can of beans on a camp fire when nobody was looking - Check
(The last one was particularly messy, and probably really was a bit danagerous... Hell I was 14!).
Anon because I'm obviously a fugative.
It was the one armed man I tell you...!
French bangers on Scout trip to Jersey, inside steel tent pole, great fun for all - well apart from Dave who got shot in the knackers by the plastic plug ejected from the other end of the tent pole :-)
Yes, done the beans one too.
Wish we had put the aerosol can inside a metal bin, good job we had quick reactions back then!
Beside this being completely fucking stupid and yes I live in American, AND I am not surprised), I always have issue with "online petitions". It's truly her community up in arms signing this, than they should get off their asses, and do some real protesting.
Every time I see an online petition I think "Hey, a piece of Electronic BS, that no one will pay attention to, has not affect, and will be largely ignored by history."
The people who grow up to fill those roles are the same kids that were scared of their own shadow & never learned to have any fun. If anything I think this should be a lesson on how it is crucial to let children have fun, otherwise you end up with a bunch of cowards in positions of power who are still 'hiding under their beds', scared of everything & expecting someone else to 'protect' them.
And yet, in that very state one can shoot an unarmed person and get off scot-free if one can make a convincing claim that they felt the now-dead completely unarmed "assailant" was threatening one's life.
Of course it helps if various stereotypes are at work reinforcing one's claim in people's minds.
I took a mental walk along this fetid towpath and concluded that the (female) kid should have shot the (older male) assistant principal. A brief investigation, some witchhunt-style innuendo and no more would have been said.
It's hard not to feel like we're doomed as a species to a future of boring mediocrity and sameness... The movie Idiocracy is a chilling preview of where we are heading...
How many adult scientists and engineers today didn't blow the occasional thing up as a kid? I doubt there are any. I used to experiment with a lot of things as a kid and had a few incidents... But it was worth it. I'm only 30, but now looking back at building rockets and tesla coils when I was 12 I think that today a kid today with a passion for science has a better chance of being accused as a radical terrorist rather than the potential Einstein that they may be.
http://www.orau.org/PTP/collection/atomictoys/GilbertU238Lab.htm
Can you imagine seeing something like this today? It's a shame that I missed the 50s.
Cheers,
Troy.
Troy,
As an American, I completely agree with you that the movie Idiocracy is not fiction it's prediction. I'll go one further by saying that the characters in the movie are not all that different than the people that are teaching our youth today, especially in poorer school districts and quite obviously in Southern Schools.
Your statement about how a "kid today with a passion for science has a better chance of being accused as a radical terrorist rather than the potential Einstein that they may be" is sadly more truthful than anyone could expect.
I posted a while back in this thread regarding how I was given direction and inspiration by the father of a childhood friend. My son is now 30 and I tried to offer him the same kind of offbeat educational experiences that I had and he has done well for himself. He and his lovely wife made me a proud Grandpa. They are both very free thinkers and have already suffered from their unwillingness to tolerate religious BS.
Oh, the price we pay, we few that can see through the injustices and stupidity of the rest of the world....and arent afraid to speak the truth. If only the truth could actually set you free instead of ruining your career.
I can only hope that our childrens children can escape from the clutches of the mentally and emotionally retarded people that now make up our "education" and "justice" system.
There is a place in Hell that burns all the hotter for those teachers who can only inspire further mediocrity and those in the legal "profession" who let emotions rule over logic and reason.
.
I grew up in an outback town in New South Wales. Not having TV, and having no friends nearby, I amused myself by building increasingly powerful radio transmitters. I used vacuum tubes salvaged from old receivers, and wound my own coils. The worst that happened was an exploding electrolytic capacitor, and a 300 volt jolt from an anode.
Although my activities were illegal, I was never in any danger of being arrested. I also used to make my own explosives, and when I was 16 I walked into a department store and bought a .22 rifle without producing any ID. I got my driver's licence by driving once around the block. Strangely, despite all this rampant social irresponsibility (both by me and by the government of the day), nobody died.
Frankly I miss the freedom, and I feel sorry for today's youth because although they have much more, they can do far less.
I am reminded of a joke... What's the difference between northern racists and souther racists? Northern racists don't mind blacks getting uppity, as long as they don't live next door. Southern racists don't mind blacks living next door, as long as they don't get uppity. Methinks this girl just got designated as 'uppity'...
What would she have got if she had thrown a triangular flapjack at someone? Death row?
See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-21923218
Perhaps Bartow High School and Castle View School should set up a twinning arrangement.
REALLY? We're going to ruin the life of a promising young student over tinfoil and toilet cleaner in a soda bottle? May I please have a plane ticket to Florida to slap some sense into an assistant principal, some cops, and a state prosecutor?
Also, for the record, many of the "capacious prisons of the USA" are already terribly overcrowded. No comment on the reasons other than to say we have a lot of people in prison whom we, as a society, would be better served to put someplace else. (Rehab centers for drug addicts, house arrest for non-violent offenders, and mental hospitals for the just plain disturbed come to mind.)
Back in the day my science teacher was always making explosives with us as part of the curriculum. On one occasion he was making up gunpowder in a pestle and mortar and struck a spark - cue column of fire and he lost an eyebrow. We all thought it was epic until the Head came in with some prospective parents (giving them the show around) and had to explain the black mark on the ceiling, smoke and all of us running for cover. Parents sent their kid to our school because they though it was great too. Probably a bit of a mistake considering my science teacher was later banged up for 8 years for being a paedophile.
Going to set up a sponsorship charity for all the burmese pythons in the everglades so there is a predator big enough to deal with ask the darwin award nominees in florida. Having had the joys of Georgia I'll bet money its to do with her colour. The highlight of my trip there was sitting on a chambered 9mm beretta left with the safety off around a 3 year old girl. They didn't understand why I went borderline berserk over the fact I could of been killed! Then theres the nice omaha racist I visited. Went for a wander and started chatting to some very polite & friendly black guys (Im so pale I burn under a 100w bulb) - my friend came out of her house like the charge of the light brigade howling that theyd murder me on the spot. Talk about cultural cringe. Racism is part of the culture out there along with gutless v8s and aircooled teeth.
school is quickly becoming the most dangerous place for a child to be. if theyre not being expelled or given a criminal record, theyre being filled with innumerable lies and misinformation by teachers who do the bare minimum to pass the tests and collect their pay cheques. academia is not important to anyone outside of academia. it's a God damn fact. maybe one in several hundred teachers cares about their pupils and that's a hugely generous estimate.
It's really not ok to play with a bottle, it's almost an act of terrorism.
On the other hand it's much better to belong to a firearm's club at 5 and get a customized for children gun, it's a patriotic constitutional right and of course there is no risk whatsoever to blow your sister's head.
I remember breaking the greenhouse at school (1969) with gunpowder made in the Chemistry lesson (there was a good(ish) reason we did this, but I forget what that was now).
And the greenhouse was about 100 yards away.
Not powerful gunpowder, but the teacher was worried about how to dispose of what was left and suggest sprinkling it over the nettles at the end of the field. So four of us set of to do that. This involved walking past the greenhouse on a path with a sharp incline, and one of us (probably me) put his shoulder through an overhanging pane. Last day before the Christmas break, so needed an urgent fix.
We had to order a new pane from the local glazier (on the school account) fetch it, and fix it that day,
That was all....
Some time ago a white female student at a school in a remarkably similar experiment mixed bleaching powder and hydrochloric acid to make a solution that would remove ink from a woodent floor.
Margaret Hilda Roberts.
On that occasion the authorities didn't clap her in irons, despite one of her fellow students choking on the chlorine gas produced.
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