This is my FML and I never realized it got published until I came across it under the random section. I thought I'd fill in the details because I think about this kid a lot. The student in question was on probation from two previous drug charges. He was a mess-- always drunk or high and everything he did was a cry for help (tagging, fighting, truancy). I'd had a meeting with his mother once already about him failing my class due to poor attendance. She accused me of lying (even though he told her he always ditched my class). He even admitted to me that he picked my class to smoke in because he wanted to get caught and he knew I would turn him in. It actually wasn't this incident that got him expelled-- a week or so later he punched his probation officer and after that I have no idea what happened to him. I don't totally blame him-- he was only 15, after all. And it was hard to see beyond the drugs and bad decisions, but he had brains and was a good artist-- he had potential. If he had had a better mother maybe he might have had a chance. Her denial damaged him considerably. I don't mind the troubled and damaged kids, but it's the parents who made them that way I have no patience for and that make my job difficult. This actually happened three years ago, so I can only hope he's pulled himself together. I know many people that have had similar rough starts to life and have made it out ok.