This is part something, in my (apparently) never ending series children are children. There seems to be a common mantra in the united states today that children should be adults, and if they don't act like adults they must be immediately and harshly punished for it.
This is something that never made sense to me, and in some sense can be crystallized in a camper i had at neringa some years ago. He was in the youngest cabin of boys but for some reason had a "girlfriend" in the youngest group of girls (both 10-11 i think) anyway on one occasion they were talking and for no reason in particular he poked her in nippular region. She took mild offense, he didn't realize that anything amiss had gone on. She of course had no developed yet, and he probably didn't even understand what a boob was yet, but if their parents had been aware, there would have been lawsuit after lawsuit. The fact of the matter was they were just kids being kids. Nobody had any sister motives, nobody was hurt, and nobody will even remember it (unless some parents enforce upon their kids how horrifyingly memorable it was.)
This has been repeatedly displayed in our current society, anything kids do that wouldn't be acceptable in a corporate society is obviously not acceptable and harshly punishable in a school society. These kids, climbed a school wall and camped out for a night, with no damage to any building or person. Harmless prank you say? there is where you would be wrong. For all the legal system can tell these students were trying to sell nuclear secrets to the iranians. Nobody was hurt and nothing was damaged in this senior prank. harmless you say? you couldn't possibly be more wrong (apparently.) the school district has not only requested legal discipline, but is also considering it's own punishment if the legal discipline doesn't go far enough. Why the punishment? because it's not very safe. So for attempting something (whether it was a political/social statement or otherwise) that was not very safe these kids must be punished to the fullest extent of the law, and even further if that is not enough. how dare someone do something that isn't very safe. who are these animals that would try something that isn't 100% rational, it's unheard of. Would you be allowed to do this if you were working for IBM, probably not, so obviously it must be evil and stamped out among all students, or anyone whose not a robot.
(by the way here's guessing if they were feminists or minority students or religiously motivated they would not only not be punished, but celebrated for this act of civil disobedience.)
http://www.mcall.com/news/local/all-a1_5solehi.6918212jun03,0,5686671.story