Thanks for the input! I do appreciate hearing the perspective from "the other side" in things like this.

Try reading the actual article before skipping down to the comments section, please.

So while the instances of both the poisoning and embedded needles are not zero, they are virtually zero when you consider the many millions of kids that have trick or treated since the early 20th century. And if you want to include guising and souling, we can go back several hundred more years without a…

The truth is, I don't know. I know I spoke to multiple people in the guidance office from time to time and I didn't actually know who all of them were. I think one or more of them were CPS. I was pretty sure, at the time, that they didn't work for the school, but again this was middle school and I was only a child at…

What is your take on my own experience, then? Do you think that's something children facing difficulties commonly have to put up with? How common is it for children to be interviewed like this - repeatedly (it was about once a month for me, for sixth, seventh, and eighth grades), and without parental knowledge (my dad…

There has never, ever, been a confirmed case of a kid being killed by tampered-with candy on Halloween, except for cases where parents tried to harm their own children by framing Halloween candy. That's a rumor, a myth, that comes around every year. Hell, even Lifehacker's fellows over at Gizmodo ran a story debunking…

It really isn't, especially when you consider that the classes right before standardized testing all all going to be reviews and cramming for the tests, and the classes right afterwards are either an easy day, a movie day, or at the very least a "Now, where were we...?" class or two. You really wouldn't miss much.

Clever of them to omit an important part of the objection...

That's an argument for changing the funding standards, not changing the rights of parents to decide on parenting decisions like how their child spends their time. It's ridiculous to pass more bad laws to support previous bad laws.

The fact that it's all about the money and that authority takes no personal interest in you - that the world only cares about you if you are useful to them - is a harsh, but important lesson for kids to learn.

Like what? How far away are these schools? Where on earth do you live that a simple walk down the street is going to end in tragedy? And how old are these "babies"? As early as fourth grade I could get up, dress myself, go to the bus on my own, get home hours before my dad would, then walk my dog through the…

It's a good lesson for kids. They are not the center of the universe. To the school, they are a product, a number, a means for them to get more money. The benevolent government and the smiles on the faces of its agents are not there to be your personal servant, but to exist and grow off of your back, and to do so it…

It's not about getting "better deals." When you have two working parents and two or three kids, each of whom are in a different grade in a different school, having a few days together in common would be nothing short of miraculous. Not to mention there are events that are not convenient, or even worse impossible, to…

It's commendable to take a personal interest in your kid's education. I know the praise of a random internet commenter means nothing, but good on you.

Agreed with you. Schools are there to educate, not to make parenting decisions. That is the job of the parent.

20 consecutive school days is four straight weeks, or rather, a straight month, of missing class. That's a really different world from a cumulative number or an absurdly low limit of "unexcused" absences, which can be as low as 2-3.

It doesn't matter what the law had in mind when they wrote it, it matters how the law is enforced. The Patriot Act had Osama bin Laden in mind when they wrote it, and it didn't stop it from being used to spy on ordinary Americans.

The law varies from state to state, but in some states a certain limit of "unexcused" absences (2 or 3 in most areas I know of - I am not a lawyer though, nor am I even a parent, I base this off of what I'm told by other people who are parents) leads to fines and investigations. What constitutes an "excused" absence…

Statistically speaking, the world is different these days. It's much, much safer than it ever was before. Any kid in the 80s or early 90s, in the worst of the crack epidemic, in any urban environment would've faced hazards unthinkable today. But this idea that our ultra-safe, white-bread suburbia is a hellscape with…

As with most cases of this, schools think they are justified in doing anything because what they do, they do for the children. So if you oppose them, you hate children. You don't hate children, do you?