Sigh. Once again, a lot of knee-jerk responses.
Let me preface my remarks by stating (for those who haven't read a post where I've noted this) that I've been a high school science teacher in public schools for the past 20 years, in two states and in very different circumstances with different clientele. This may give me a prejudiced view, but not any more so than the opinions I've read in this thread.
Was the kid right? Not exactly. Was the response right? Not exactly.
Glad to see that some are recommending that EVERYONE (those involved and those making comments about the situation) try to use reason.
Officials not making a statement in this case are NOT "hiding" behind a policy. They would be wrong to make public comment about specifics, as it violates the family's privacy rights -- even though the family is talking about the issue in public.
Student should not have carried the pellet gun himself. Yes, time is an issue, but the tardy policy is usually more flexible than the weapons policy, even in the "zero tolerance for everything" times of today. Assuming he brought it straight to officials, at least his intent was good.
Officials are in kind of a bind. Wrong to discipline this student with anything other than the suggested training (if the facts are as represented). Does open the "can of worms" on possession. We can say that each case should be decided individually, but that brings up the cry of unequal treatment (racism/classism/assorted other "-isms") from those who are then punished more severely for what is claimed to be the same situation. We say that people should use common sense and show good judgment... until that judgment conflicts with ours, at which point we resort to saying that those who think differently than we do are "brain-dead", oppressive, evil, etc.
I sense a great deal of animosity toward schools (also usually directed toward legal system in this forum). Problem is not schools, courts, etc., much like the problems with violence are not problems with the weapons (as we often try to point out here). The problem is that all of these systems and entities involve PEOPLE. Life is a grand experiment, and humans are a lousy test subject -- we are non-uniform and unpredictable. These are not good characteristics for your experimental organism.
Here in rural MN, I suspect the situation would have been dealt with differently in some schools. They are having more locations go to "zero tolerance" as we've had some significant violent episodes as of late. Still, the attitude is much more accepting of guns and knives as legitimate tools, rather than the equivalent of WMD. One young lady actually remarked to me in class that the ruling that firearms could not be possessed within "x" feet of a school (1000?) was "dumb". Her reasoning was, "You KNOW that during hunting season, just about every car in the parking lot has guns and ammunition in them. The kids go out hunting before and after school." Can't say that I'd hear that in the places I taught in CA.
Anyway, if people would stop suing every time something didn't go their way, and if people would stop to think about and take responsibilty for their actions (this goes for everyone in this story), we probably wouldn't be having the discussion in this thread.