NCIS

(No Crime In School)

In 9.75 years of blissful freedom from student thievery in my classroom - a substantial fact to note, just ask any of your educator friends - I recently found myself at a loss to find my beloved* clickable Sharpie.  I had possession of it one class period, then, poof.  Gone.  I frantically searched my desk & immediate area, but reality set in quickly:  I'd been pen-jacked.  I also keep such Spartan work spaces that there was never really a question of having misplaced it entirely from sight.

In response I did what any affronted victim would do:  I posted a "Wanted" sign in my classroom, with the requisite pitiful sounding verbiage.  There was no reward offered.  This was a sheer test of adolescent integrity.

I did not receive my beloved back (yet), but what did take place was almost worth the mild thievery frustration.  One of my more clever honors students approached me, inquiring if she could show me something on her cell phone.  Normally I would shy away from this offer, but this student is not the type I'd expect to show a teacher a video of mean girls fighting in the bathroom or a photo of herself wearing the same type of clothes that my Mother warned me not to wear when I was this girl's age.  The student leans in with her phone, asking, "Did the pen look like this?"  Imagine this photo on a cell phone screen:

 (not the actual photo taken by my student surveiller)

"And like this?"  <imagine a second photo of the same pen on the screen, taken from a different angle>

Sure enough, the photo subject appeared remarkably like my beloved.  "My precious..."  (Lord of the Rings reference) My honors student knew which class period the pen went missing in and informed me who she believed to be the illegitimate, new owner of my beloved.  She had taken it upon herself to collect what she believed to be photo evidence.

Flash forward to the suspect student's period and coincidence or not, the accused thief was using an exact match of my beloved.  Sigh.  In the end, I did not strong arm the suspected thief.  The suspect only used the pen once, and, the sting of the theft was made sweeter by the knowledge that there's at least one other student taking action to right a wrong in the big, bad world of pen thievery.

*Sharpies are always beloved in my world, and I purchased this particular one.