One event almost every Triton student this year remembers was the dog search, when police officers entered Triton with specially trained drug sniffing dogs and went through classrooms and students belongings.  This event lead to a lot of confusion among students, and definitely shook up the mood for the day. But, these officers had proper warrants and permission. However, the administrations permission to search students falls under a different category.  The current rule in schools for staff members to be able to search students is that if the staff member has a probable cause for searching a students bag they can. For example if a teacher saw a student smoking, they could search the students bag. One great example is in the TLO vs New Jersey case were a teacher searched a student because they saw them smoking and the student tried to argue it in court.  In the end the supreme court stated in an article by USA.gov titled “TLO Vs New Jersey”, “the school had met a “reasonableness” standard for conducting such searches at school.”  

Despite the fact that this rule makes sense at first glance, it can seem a bit more skeptical at a closer glance.  In an article by USA.gov titled “Tlo vs New Jersey”, the court ruled “students’ expectation of privacy must be balanced against the needs of school authorities to maintain an educational environment.” So for teacher to be able to search a student’s bag, they need a reason.  However, the teacher could just lie and claim that they had a reason to search the student. In this case, it would be hard for a student to defend themselves and it would be very embarrassing for them to be searched in front of a large group of people.

With the modern world of technology news, videos, and pictures can spread very quickly thanks to smartphones.  If a student where to get searched, news of it would most certainly be heard around the school.

Some may argue in the case that this rule is fair since teachers should have the liberty to be able to search students in case they have harmful substances that could harm themselves or others.  Although, in essence this is a good idea this power can be too easily abusable and can make school more difficult than it needs to be for students.

In my opinion the best course of actions in schools for the teacher to be allowed to search a student, they would have to confirm it with another teacher to ensure that searching the student is warranted and decided by two adults instead of one just in case.