Story Archive

Breaking Bad

Paris Gray, the graduating senior class vice president from Mundy’s Mill High School in Clayton County, Ga., dictated the Senior Quote to be included by her portrait in the yearbook. “When the going gets tough just remember to Barium, Carbon, Potassium, Thorium, Astatine, Arsenic, Sulfur, Uranium, Phosphorus.” When yearbooks were distributed her mother was among those calling her a “nerd” — until someone reduced the chemical elements to their abbreviated names on the Periodic Table of the Elements: “...remember to BaCK ThAt AsS UP.” Once the assistant principal realized the meaning of the message, he gave Gray an in-school suspension, and told her that she would not get to go on the Senior Walk, and would not be allowed to give her graduation speech. “I think their reaction was beyond what it should have been because nobody understood it,” she said. After an uproar at the school’s overreaction, the district superintendent countermanded school officials and told Gray to “give the best speech ever.” (RC/WSB Atlanta) ...To do that, the title would need to be along the lines of “Having the Maturity and Sense to Give a Measured Response to School Challenges — Administrator Edition”.