California schoolkids have buckets of fun

Boy, the news these days is full of stories about kids, schools, and toilets. PoopReporters will recall a water main break in Texas last week that forced a school to bus its pupils to other schools' toilets [1]. This week we get a schoolyard tale of bathroom angst from Inglewood, California, where the principal of the Worthington Elementary School forced kids to use buckets in the classroom [2] when they had to go tinkle or poopie.

Yup, you read it right. Buckets. As in unzip and whiz, or squat and deliver -- with all of your little buddies (not to mention the class bully) within earshot.

Turns out, according to school officials, it was all due to a misunderstanding.

To prevent the children from leaving school to participate in the immigration rallies taking place that day, Principal Angie Marquez enacted what she thought was the correct procedure for locking down the school. Apparently she didn't study the very confidential, tippy-top secret manual that only principals, superintendents and teachers get to see too closely -- because Ms. Marquez inadvertently read the directions for lockdown in the event of nuclear attack. This form of lockdown dictates that no one may leave the classroom for any reason, which means buckets must be used in the classroom to ensure that that no child gets nuked by terrorists while walking down the corridor to the little boys' or girls' room.

It should be comforting to know that, in the event of nuclear holocaust, our nation's schools have a potty plan. But in the meantime, Inglewood needs to come up with a less extreme version for the apparently more commonplace immigration-protest-rally-prevention lockdown.