Education

America 2014: Public high school suspends girl for five days for FAVORITING TWEETS

Eric Owens Editor
Font Size:

The principal at a small-town South Carolina high school has suspended a student for five days because she clicked Twitter’s “favorite” button and thereby favorited a tweet at a controversial, grossly immature Twitter page called HsConfessionSC.

The suspension occurred at Hartsville High School in Hartsville, S.C., local CBS affiliate WBTW reports.

The suspended student is senior Demi Grant. She apparently pushed the favorite button for some tweets. It’s not clear if she was in school or anywhere near school grounds when this happened.

“I favorited all of them because I just thought they were funny,” Grant told WBTW. “I didn’t favorite because, you know, they were true. I just favorited them because I thought they were funny.”

Among the tweets Grant favorited was a specific tweet that referred to a Hartsville High student killed in a car crash in 2012. It seems to have been this action that angered school officials.

Ironically, Grant had gotten in trouble previously for expressing online frustration because someone started a fake social media account using the deceased girl’s name.

School officials disciplined about 30 students for visiting the HsConfessionSC Twitter account, calling their actions and Grant’s actions “cyber-bullying.”

“Whenever we were called in there the principal looked at all of us and he said that we made him sick,” Grant said.

According to the Hartsville High webpage, the school’s principal is Charlie Burry, Jr.

Only Grant received a suspension.

Grant’s mother, Stephanie Grant, isn’t happy that her daughter was singled out for such a harsh punishment.

“I am thoroughly disappointed with Hartsville High School and administration,” she told the CBS affiliate.

“Five days suspension for favoriting a tweet? Wasn’t her words. It was no name in the tweet.  She was bullying according to the school district, but I don’t know who she bullied,” the mad mother explained.

“There’s nothing really your children can do at school or outside of school that the district can’t punish them for,” she also noted.

The mother and daughter tried to appeal the suspension, apparently unsuccessfully. They say they worry that the four lost days will eventually catch up to Demi academically.

Meanwhile, Audrey Childers, a spokeswoman for the Darlington County school district, called the tweets on HsConfessionSC “distasteful and untrue.” She also characterized them as “dangerous.”

Childers also suggested that the school district’s crack detectives “are actively investigating the situation and have asked for law enforcement’s help.”

The Twitter page @HsConfessionSC is still very much an ongoing concern. It attracts students from all over the state.

The tag line for @HsConfessionSC states:

Dm me your dirtiest, nastiest, most absurd secrets about your high school in south carolina. And i’ll tweet them. Not claiming they are 100% Factual.

The Twitter account boasts 5,083 followers and 1,296 tweets.

While there is an occasional glimmer of wit, most of the tweets are disgusting — basically, vile anonymous bathroom graffiti preserved in cyberspace. Here are a few recent example tweets from the account that are reasonably printable:

Follow Eric on Twitter and on Facebook, and send education-related story tips to erico@dailycaller.com.