Radical prevention, please

These days, no bomb threat can be considered an idle one.

Neither can the threat of punishment.

That's why it's so encouraging to see Richmond County public schools propose a tougher-than-nails policy on bomb threats and false fire alarms: a one-year expulsion, followed by a second year at an alternative school - a full two-year removal from one's regular school.

Good.

Even better would be a radical, districtwide crackdown on all types of antisocial behavior: Remember the brawls last fall, one of which led to a girl falling out and getting run over by a school bus?

By the time law enforcement officers must be called, it's already too late.

We need some radical prevention.

There are two rather radical ideas we would encourage the school board to consider.

One is to eliminate attendance areas to the extent possible - and simply throw open the doors to all the district's schools.

That would do a number of very beneficial things.

It would make schools compete for pupils - giving an instant incentive for underperforming schools to do better in order to attract "customers."

Just as importantly, it would give the district leverage over pupils and parents: They would have to agree to certain rules and regulations and standards to attend the school of their choice. If that covenant is breached, the district could hold in reserve an alternative school or schools for pupils who don't want to live by the rules. The least infraction could bring at least the threat of expulsion from the desired school.

The other thing we encourage the district to do is to make every school a magnet school. The concept works, plain and simple. It makes a school into a facility parents feel privileged to send their children to - while giving the school freer rein to offer specialized curricula, such as fine arts or computer science.

You could even look at the alternative school or schools as "magnet" schools - "attracting" those families for whom education and following rules in a civil society aren't important.

We truly have gotten to the point that such pupils need to be quarantined.

Anything short of that is nipping around the edges.