Just wondering - (for example someone setting fire to the place or a dodgy teacher) at my school Someone got knocked out with a bag after a lad threw it at him and a lad got expelled for hitting a teacher and on my first week at the school , two year 11s had a fight in the school hall.
That explains a lot. We got up to tons of mischief which I won't go into here and I'm sure that in the 30 years since I left my high schools (I went to 2) plenty more has happened. What you read about in the papers makes high school seem lawless.
It's all relative. What we thought was outrageous, way back when, is pretty tame these days. When you have to walk through a metal detector to get to class, you know something is out of whack with the school. On the other hand, when a 1st grader gets suspended for pointing his finger at someone during recess and going "Bang, Bang!" because of a no tolerance for guns policy, the outrage becomes comical.
I recently met an old school friend whom I hadn't seen for decades, and I told him that I was now a governor of the school. "You?" he said. "You were a bloody hooligan." And so I was. My most fondly remembered prank occurred when I was an A-level chemistry student. Because of a shortage of teaching space, the next lesson in the A-level chemistry laboratory was to have been conducted by a much disliked history teacher. I made some phenyl isocyanide, and just before we were due to leave the lab, I poured it down the sink. If you've never smelled this substance, it is thousands of times worse than hydrogen sulphide, which merely smells of rotten eggs. Not only did the history lesson had to be cancelled but the smell got into the ventilation, and the school closed early for the day. Irresponsible, I know, but my excuse is that I was only 16 at the time. If I did this now, I'd probably be arrested as a terrorist.