KANSAS CITY, Kan. — Five suspended seniors won’t get their diplomas at Thursday night’s graduation ceremony at Turner High School.
Students say it’s because of a senior prank blown out of proportion. Their families say its unfair that their kids were singled-out.
School officials confirm it was last Friday when their school cafeteria was turned upside down. An email from the Turner Schools office confirms that many students were involved in a food fight, and it cost five of them the chance to participant in graduation ceremonies.
Their parents told me that’s more punishment for them than it is for the students who broke the rules.
A student’s cell phone picked up the action as the Turner High School cafeteria went crazy last Friday.
Video shows some students running for cover, while others throwing food as part of the fracas.
“I’m upset. I don’t get to walk,” Kenny Clark, a suspended Turner High senior, said.
Five of them will answer for the fight, including 18-year old senior Kenny Clark. He and four others are suspended from school, and won’t be allowed to walk across the stage during Thursday’s school graduation ceremony.
“Silly senior prank,” Heather Clark, Kenny’s mother, said.
Both Clarks say they know what Kenny and his friends did was wrong, but it isn’t worthy of being punished twice.
“Bad decision,” Heather Clark said. “I don’t think it’s worthy of them not walking across the stage. That’s punishing parents and families.”
Turner Schools District Assistant Superintendent Jason Dandoy told FOX 4 News videotape shows that some students were the instigators of Friday’s food fight. That’s why students like Clark are being punished.
“It’s heartbreaking,” Resi Custer, Kos’ mother, said.
“There was over 100 kids involved, and they’re not willing to show me the video. I have no proof of why they’re suspending him,” Custer said.
Custer says Dandoy told her it’s against school policy to share that video with family members.
“They can’t get their yearbooks signed,” Custer said. “They can’t go to after-graduation parties. Anything.”
“I want to know why five kids were singled out — out of one hundred, and I can’t get an answer to that question.”
The five suspended students will also take their final exams on Wednesday, while other students are scheduled for a day off. Dandoy says school surveilance cameras caught the food fight on tape. However, he denied our request for a copy of the video.
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