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Given the educational standards of today, I'm happy to have received my formal schooling in the '60s. It's the only reason I can think of as to why I have a high school diploma.

Had I gone to school in the last 10 years, I would have only made it partway through the third grade. That's still more than enough education to write a newspaper column, but not much else.

The problem today would be the zero tolerance of most public schools regarding anything resembling a weapon or part of a weapon.

For example, last week Bradley Dirkmann, 9, of Marble Knob, Va., found a rusty 2-inch bolt on his way to school. He put it in his pocket. Big mistake.

Later, when a teacher at Bradley's elementary school saw the bolt, she immediately recognized it for what it really was. That particular bolt had once secured a toilet seat aboard a U.S. Navy destroyer.

Even though the destroyer (DD-324 Mordecai Furpp) had long since been decommissioned and scrapped, the bolt had still once been part of a deadly weapon.

Bradley was immediately sent home and eventually suspended for 30 days because he had violated the school's zero tolerance policy regarding that sort of thing.

I'm kidding. That never happened. It's ridiculous, right? Or it would be if stupider things hadn't happened in the name of zero tolerance.

Last week, New Jersey fifth-grader Aarin Moody was kicked out of school for accidentally bringing a foam Nerf bullet to school.

Yeah, a Nerf dart. You know, the kind with a rubber suction cup on the end? Yeah, I shoot them at the television screen whenever I think KUTV-Channel 2 anchor Mark Koelbel is making up the news.

However, because Aarin's foam dart had a toothpick attached to one end, it was categorized as a "self-constructed weapon" by officials at Uptown Complex School — even though he didn't have the gun to fire it.

Aarin was initially expelled from school, but this was later changed to a five-day-in-school suspension and a permanent entry on his record that says he brought a makeshift weapon to school.

I am not making this %@$# up. See for yourself at: http://thestupidnewsnetwork.com/category/certified-stupid/.

While you're there, check out the story about the Louisiana eighth-grader who was arrested and booked for six days because he had thrown some Skittles on the bus the day before.

A school resource officer handcuffed him, dragged him out of class and offered to beat the snot out of him. The boy was charged with "interference with an educational facility." Oh, and assault. The kid spent six days in a juvenile detention center before finally seeing a judge.

Since we're on the subject of zero tolerance stupidity, let us pause for a moment and remember the 7-year-old Baltimore, Md., boy who was kicked out of school for two days in 2013 for nibbling a Pop-Tart into the shape of a handgun.

The kid didn't take anyone hostage with his Pop-Tart gun, but he got the boot nonetheless. He eventually made up the work and transferred to another school where, presumably, he's now smart enough not to nibble a Pop-Tart into the shape of a roadside bomb.

While it's hard to know what to say in the face of such bureaucratic lunacy, I do know what to think.

I'm glad I got my public education in a time when schools were still technically smarter than me.

Robert Kirby can be reached at rkirby@sltrib.com or facebook.com/stillnotpatbagley. Find his past columns at http://www.sltrib.com/lifestyle/kirby.