Earlier this month, 17-year-old high school student Austin Metcalf was stabbed to death at a track meet in Frisco, Texas. Metcalf died in his twin brother’s arms.
As an educator who lives just down the road, I know too well how our system failed to keep Metcalf out of harm’s way.
Karmelo Anthony, also 17, has been charged with first-degree murder in the fatal stabbing. They had never met before the track meet, according a witness. Anthony brought a knife to the track meet and sat under another team’s tent. When asked to move, he reportedly refused and became aggressive. Metcalf stepped in to ask him to move again, to which Anthony responded, “Make me move,” according to Metcalf’s twin, who watched the events. Then Austin Metcalf grabbed Anthony’s backpack and Anthony stabbed him in the chest, his brother said.
Some have tried to make this about race — Metcalf was white, Anthony was black. But let’s not make this about race. This is about human decency and the culture that has eroded it.
A dangerous mindset has won over many young men today. It tells them that nothing really matters — burn it all down and take what you can. It demands respect while offering none in return. It scoffs at authority, mocks standards, and justifies any action that serves one’s immediate desires. I have seen this mindset spread in my years working at a relatively well-off suburban high school down the road from Metcalf’s school. Countless examples come to mind.
No Consequences
Students today know they can get away with almost anything. Last year, a 16-year-old student-athlete pushed me, cursed me out, and walked out of class. A few days later, I sat across from him in the assistant principal’s office. The assistant principal gave him candy and spoke to him like he was an upset eight-year-old. His father tried to blame me for the altercation. After a half-hearted apology, the young man was allowed to return to class without a disciplinary referral.
This has been standard protocol in education for more than a decade. Play on your phone all class and teachers will just keep pleading with you to put it away. Get caught cheating on a test and the teacher will just make you take a new one. And if a teacher asks you to stop in the hall because you are violating a policy, you can just keep walking while shouting profanities.
Education is full of good people who try to hold the line but, overwhelmingly, this culture of excuse making and second chances reigns. Dangerous students remain in classrooms. Administrators hope for the best, while enforcing no real standards for the rest. Those who want to cause chaos will, and their peers will celebrate them for it.
For every dangerous student who should be kicked off campus, there are hundreds of misguided students who just need to know where the line is. The student who pushed me and cursed me out would have never done so in a world where he knew he wouldn’t get away with it. Likewise, millions of students might pay attention and do their work if they truly believed they could fail.
But the prevailing educational paradigm would rather perpetuate the delusion that you can reach every student with a bit of understanding, support, and a good conversation.
Alternatives to a Failing Approach
I have recently passed the administrator certification test for my state. The practice test in the preparation manual asks a question about how a new principal should handle the high number of suspensions on his campus. Of the responses offered, the correct answer is:
B. Shifting the focus of discipline from punishment and exclusion to practices that build students’ ability to reflect, accept accountability, and take action to change.
This sort of answer sounds great and even mentions accountability, but in reality, it promotes the exact opposite. The manual goes on to explain:
Option B is correct because the positive behavioral interventions and supports (PBIS) method, which is described, places a high value on the engagement of the student and is shown to be effective in reducing disciplinary referrals among all students, especially African American and Hispanic males.
Note that the explanation justifies the superiority of PBIS by claiming this approach reduces referrals. It most certainly does. Any campus that embraces such an approach will also go out of their way not to make referrals. Because consequences don’t work, right?
But they do. My district had seen an increase in violent fights going viral, with students performing for the camera. Finally, they instituted a no-tolerance policy: if you fight, you are automatically sent to the District Alternative Education Program. Your sports season is over, and you are removed from campus. Overnight, the fights virtually ceased. This is the answer. Schools cannot continue prioritizing convenience and optics over discipline and order.
Yet, more often, schools refuse to enforce discipline. Instead, we invest in weapon detection technology and turn teachers into Transportation Security Administration agents at the doors each morning while allowing blatant disrespect and disorder to flourish inside. We lower expectations, excuse bad behavior, and pretend that endless second chances build character. But they don’t. They breed entitlement and, in the worst cases, violence.
A culture that refuses to enforce consequences is a culture that enables tragedy. Austin Metcalf did not die because of a lack of security protocols. He died because adults failed to hold the line long before he met Karmelo Anthony.
Tillman Plank is pseudonym for an educator in Texas.
