Last week, a first-grade student at Bagley Elementary School in Jefferson County, Alabama was suspended for pretending his fingers were shaped like a gun while playing with another student at recess. The boy's father, Jarrod Belcher, quickly pushed back on the Class III suspension, which is considered the most serious by the school system and which prohibits the student from returning to school grounds until a conference is held. Typically, violations such as arson, assault with a weapon, selling drugs, and bomb threats are reserved for this type of disciplinary action. 

A redacted copy of the notice of suspension (to protect the privacy of the Belcher family) can be found here. While Mr. Belcher's pushback has led to the school dropping the suspension down to a Class II level and the young boy has been permitted to return to school, this gross overreach by administrators could still lead to the student being labelled as potentially violent and dangerous on his permanent record, which would follow him for life. 

In response, Gun Owners of America has teamed up with local counsel and state-based BamaCarry in Alabama to send a letter to the school administration, the school board, and school district demanding the total removal of any record of an infraction, disciplinary action, or other sort of report on the activities in question. In addition, the letter demands that the existing policy that led to this improper punishment be publicly amended to allow age-appropriate play for children, such as what occurred at Bagley Elementary last week.