6 ms·

Texas Teen Still Suspended Despite No Charges, Will Change Schools

159 points by austenallred 11y ago

vishaldpatel 11y ago
Dear Texas, we'll happily take your unwanted geniuses. Best Wishes, - California.
- unethical_ban 11y ago
  Dear Mr Patel, Take the reddit stereotypes back to reddit. -Smart, civic Texan with smart Texan friends.
  - rblatz 11y ago
    Uh, if you were so smart you'd understand that this is in response to a school in Texas badly handling a smart kid doing smart kid things. Has any high level official in Texas apologized, or said anything decrying this student's treatment? If not, then it seems like Texas is standing behind this.
    - MrZongle2 11y ago
      I don't recall any Texan politicians decrying cannibalism today, either. I guess we know what that means, right? Or we could assume for a moment that not every event requires a politician's commentary. I didn't need to see Obama or Zuck's responses before I had determined (for myself! Imagine!) that the school's actions were absurd, overblown, and counter-productive. Perhaps you should do some research as to the response of some Texans to this travesty (e.g. http://motherboard.vice.com/read/dallas-hackers-are-already-helping-ahmed-mohamed-with-his-next-inventions http://motherboard.vice.com/read/dallas-hackers-are-already-... ) before you resort to the tired "Texas means backward and stupid" meme.
      - niccaluim 11y ago
        Nor have they decried ten-foot-tall lizard men, but then there aren't any national stories about ten-foot-tall lizard men in Texas right now, are there? The President commented on this, fer chrissakes. I think a few remarks from Texas politicians are warranted.
        MrZongle2 11y ago
        No, action from Texas educators is warranted: specifically, actions that acknowledge that what happened to this 14-year-old is incompatible with a positive learning environment and a commitment to education and actions to ensure it doesn't happen again. A pox on the politicians. They'll spin this eight ways to Sunday and nothing will be accomplished.
      - braythwayt 11y ago
        > not every event requires a politician's commentary. No, not every event. Just the ones that give the impression that there is an ongoing systemic abuse of the very rights and principles that America is founded on. The fact that you brush this off as unimportant is exactly the problem here.
        MrZongle2 11y ago
        "The fact that you brush this off as unimportant is exactly the problem here." And how does "absurd, overblown, and counter-productive" (my words) translate into "unimportant"? The words of politicians are generally unimportant, as they are easy to come by and seldom backed by action. That was my point. Must I too engage in today's Two Minutes' Hate to pacify the Outrage Patrol?
    - amyjess 11y ago
      Nah, it's just Irving that's a shithole. Most of the cities around it are fine, including Dallas proper. Last year, an article about the least LGBT-friendly places in the US was published [0]. Irving landed at #2. That same article mentioned that Dallas proper was one of the most LGBT-friendly places in the US. It's not much of a stretch to say that this applies not just to LGBT people but to all kinds of people that the crazy right-wing fundamentalists dislike, including smart people and Muslims. From my personal observation having lived in Dallas and Richardson all my life, I can vouch for this. It's widely acknowledged here that Dallas is a very progressive city and that Irving is a shithole. Besides, most of our tech industry is concentrated in Richardson [1]. Between UTD, TI, and the Telecom Corridor, Richardson is a pretty damn good place to be if you're smart. [0] http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/11/22/247-wall-st-lgbt-cities/19354553/ http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/11/22/247-... [1] Richardson is a suburb to the northeast of Dallas in the same way that Irving is a suburb to the northwest of Dallas, so it's a pretty apt comparison. Actually, Dallas is kind of shaped like Godzilla: on a map of city limits, Richardson and Irving look like they sit on Dallas's shoulders (though Irving is kinds leaning off the edge).
      - rblatz 11y ago
        I live in Arizona, so I understand living in an area that is nationally famous for being a bit backwards. Parts of Texas are absolutely amazing, just like here in Arizona. But we both are paying the price for our states' having a poor reputation.
      - ashwinaj 11y ago
        > It's not much of a stretch to say that this applies not just to LGBT people but to all kinds of people that the crazy right-wing fundamentalists dislike, including smart people and Muslims. From my personal observation having lived in Dallas and Richardson all my life, I can vouch for this My general observation as an outsider in Texas (Dallas 3 years and Austin 4 years) is way off from yours. It's not a question about right wing hatred, that's just hyperbole. There is an attitude in Texas where if "you aren't one of us", you don't belong here (in a subtle way). That in my opinion is undeniable. I bet if this incident was at Highland park, the result would be the same.
    - arcseco 11y ago
      The comment was a sarcastic joke and did not further the discussion. I like that HN is a community that tries to promote insightful comments and not jokes to the top of the comment page.
  - ossreality 11y ago
    Did you just miss the point then? I think the point was "Texas politicians will stifle the youth and further, stifle innovation at large". Maybe try to see the merit in someone else's post instead of being butthurt. No one cares where you're from, soryr.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 11y ago
  California might be confusing enthusiasm for genius.
  - lazaroclapp 11y ago
    Perhaps, but one can indeed go very far before the distinction even becomes relevant...
  - zbyte64 11y ago
    One precedes the other.
    - 0xdeadbeefbabe 11y ago
      California and confusion?
- kawliga 11y ago
  He disassembled a clock and then reassembled it inside a case that resembled a bomb (however hollywood-esque it may seem). The kid might be "smart" but I wouldn't jump to the "genius" conclusion.
  - cheald 11y ago
    Homemade electronics are pretty fragile. A hardshell case is entirely appropriate for transporting such a project.
    - duskwuff 11y ago
      My understanding is that the police put it in that case to take pictures.
      - kawliga 11y ago
        http://i.imgur.com/jGZ8RBU.jpg http://i.imgur.com/jGZ8RBU.jpg
- wehrmachtenvy 11y ago
  Maybe he can fix California's water and budget problems. The geniuses there now can't.
  - yellowapple 11y ago
    Less "can't" and more "won't". A lot of the most water-wasteful crops (like almonds) might as well be staple foods in your average rich-Californian diet.
- bduerst 11y ago
  They'll still stand out, seeing as they probably have all their vaccinations :)
  - api 11y ago
    So you're saying California needs more geniuses then?
- bruceb 11y ago
  What makes you think he is a genius?
lazaroclapp 11y ago
Good for whichever school he chooses to go to! Any announcement on that yet, or is he waiting for his letters of admission and full scholarship to all the top private schools in the country? ;)
- infamouscow 11y ago
  He's 14.
- freehunter 11y ago
  I'm not sure top private schools would just hand out full rides to a high school student who built a clock... if they do, I went to a really shitty school for nothing.
  - lazaroclapp 11y ago
    Neither would you normally get invited to the White House or Facebook HQ for building a clock. But he should definitely take advantage of the 15 min of fame to go to the best place possible. And I mean top private high schools, not necessarily college yet. Pretty sure anyone who builds interesting science projects while in a clearly unsupportive environment would thrive at a top level STEM high-school.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- austenallred 11y ago
  He said during the presser he wants to go to MIT
jotux 11y ago
Picture of the clock the kid made: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CPCXrKUVEAApkmV.jpg https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CPCXrKUVEAApkmV.jpg
- DanBC 11y ago
  the fucking giant 7 segment LED doesn't make you think "clock"? Or at least "no idiot would put a ridiculously large flashing display on a bomb"? I mean, he probably needs a bit of advice about mains wiring and safety. He can probably get that when he's being shown the Mars rovers (or any of the other stuff kind NASA people have invited him to) http://www.cbc.ca/news/trending/ahmed-mohamed-arrested-clock-bomb-1.3230261 http://www.cbc.ca/news/trending/ahmed-mohamed-arrested-clock... EDIT (after several comments) I mistakenly thought this was a briefcased sized case, but it's not, it's much smaller. There's a battery connector for scale. So, I shouldn't have said "fucking huge LED". It's just normal size LED clock.
  - austenallred 11y ago
    He's 14 years old. He'll figure it out.
  - nak_attack 11y ago
    That's exactly what made it look like a bomb to the dumbass principal: > The principal threatened to expel him if he didn’t make a written statement, he said. > “They were like, ‘So you tried to make a bomb?’” Ahmed said. > “I told them no, I was trying to make a clock.” > “He said, ‘It looks like a movie bomb to me.’”
  - beat 11y ago
    Bombs on tv ALWAYS have giant flashing 7 segment LEDs counting down to the time when the white male American hero disarms them.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - rnovak 11y ago
    I think the biggest thing that says not a bomb was that he asked permission _before_ bringing it in[1]. [1]https://twitter.com/AnneClaireCNN/status/644158607035133952 https://twitter.com/AnneClaireCNN/status/644158607035133952
wheaties 11y ago
This is going to be one hell of a college letter. You know, the one that all colleges ask you write? He could write it today or he could wait to write it after he met the President.
smpetrey 11y ago
If this kid applies to the University of North Texas TAMS program... he has the highest letter of recommendation coming his way from not only the POTUS but Zuck too. http://www.theverge.com/2015/9/16/9338747/mark-zuckerberg-facebook-ahmad-mohamed-clock http://www.theverge.com/2015/9/16/9338747/mark-zuckerberg-fa...
- tamstams 11y ago
  An ex-admin of TAMS said that they'd love to have him.
- seiji 11y ago
  Your phrasing kinda implies the "Zuck" person of your sentence is more important than the "POTUS" person. Does having something happen to you instantly qualify you to receive insightful recommendation letters from strangers though? The Internet has developed an overly powerful hero amplification beam it shines down when things happen to someone, but does it necessarily reflect the person themselves? Sudden unrelenting Internet-powred fame (either as the receiver or the giver of fame) can drive some people a bit mad after the fact too.
  - smtddr 11y ago
    >>Your phrasing kinda implies the "Zuck" person of your sentence is more important than the "POTUS" person. I like Obama 'n all, but in today's world of technology(this is about a student building a clock, unprompted)... I believe the opinion of Facebook's CEO tech-geek outweights Obama's.
    - waterlesscloud 11y ago
      By the time the kid graduates high school, Zuck will still be running Facebook and Obama will be just another ex-president. ;-)
    - seiji 11y ago
      I'm pretty sure looking up to anybody in management roles at Facebook is a sign of advanced mental illness.
tamstams 11y ago
My alma mater, an early college high school in the Dallas area, seems to want him. https://mobile.twitter.com/KevinRoden/status/644006028435042305 https://mobile.twitter.com/KevinRoden/status/644006028435042... Really hope it works out!
ck2 11y ago
Not that this actually matters but out of morbid curiosity - did he actually assemble a clock kit or did he simply disassemble a regular nightstand clock and put it into a little carry case? I mean it is good he is learning how things work inside but I don't think he actually made anything and actually was fooling around with an openly exposed 110VAC transformer. He definitely needs some guidance and help with this stuff before he hurts himself or burns the house down. This is like that woman at MIT who had a circuit board clipped onto her clothes and went to pick someone up at the airport and almost got murdered by security.
- jotux 11y ago
  Looking at the photo it looks like he put a nightstand clock into a case. I did this a lot as a kid -- removed broken stuff, poked around to fix it, glued it into a different box. It's one of the reasons I went into electrical engineering.
  - ck2 11y ago
    Yeah I was fortunate to have grown up when Heathkit had stores, they blew away Radio Shack. Could never afford anything in there but the catalogs were fun to read and store was amazing to browse. It's a shame we have nothing like that today, electronics are just "magic" to people now that is made elsewhere.
- mindslight 11y ago
  Playing is an important part of learning. When you're young is a great time to get shocked by 170v. Better than the rectified 340v from the caps in a power supply.
- Vivtek 11y ago
  Given that the original freakout on the part of the English teacher was precipitated by the alarm going off while the clock was in his bag, I'm thinking it was battery-powered, not plugged in. Power cords are cheap, easily accessible wire that are not necessarily always carrying grid voltage. Although that picture certainly shows a plug, so who knows? I do wonder how the alarm went off - if that isn't just embellishment after the fact. That said, I certainly fooled around with live power when I was his age. The house didn't burn down because we had a competent electrician install circuit breakers when we built it.
rblatz 11y ago
Hopefully the town remembers this next time they vote for their school board. The principal and the superintendent are answerable to these elected people, and almost no one cares who wins.
- kaonashi 11y ago
  They're probably still punishing him because of the voters in the district, not despite them.
  - beat 11y ago
    Sad but true.
beat 11y ago
Lucky boy, to have parents so committed and willing to stand by him, and help him grow into his talent. Unlucky boy, to have to do it in a place filled with bigots and morons. On the other hand, this kind of setback builds character. It teaches clever children of the tyranny of petty adults with petty authority, so they know what to distrust, and what to not become themselves.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
nak_attack 11y ago
I don't see anything on this page referring to the student remaining suspended.
coldcode 11y ago
I am (yet again) embarrassed to be from Texas. If you read what Steve Jobs did in high school, if that was today and he was Muslim, he'd never started Apple. Here we are looking at diversity in the face, a young engineer proud of his learning, and the hicks in Irving brand him as the next Osama. That stupid mayor's tweet is classic.
revelation 11y ago
This is of course the instinctive response of all small-minded persons challenged in their "authority". In the face of opposition, never change course! It's the ultimate downfall of bureaucracy, humans will burn down the world before admitting their mistakes.
Xyik 11y ago
This is ridiculously overblown. Glad to see people defending him and righting a wrong, but all of this is going to inflate his head.
- moinnadeem 11y ago
  I disagree. He seems level-headed and focused enough that he could take this as motivation. If he was arrogant, he would have capitalized on it, created a social media account and a gofundme. He seems humble to me. Source: 17-year old who faced similar media attention, it did inflate my ego a bit despite attempts to remain humble.
gyardley 11y ago
So, should we consider this event a net negative because this poor teenager got perp walked by a bunch of people who were quite likely racist and apparently too dumb to tell a circuit board from a bomb? Or should we consider this event a net positive because he's almost certainly going to end up at a much better high school after getting to meet the president and Mark Zuckerberg? On the one hand, no one should have to go through what he did. On the other hand, the fourteen-year-old version of me would've happily put himself in handcuffs for a chance at getting out of my cow-town high school.
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  Its a negative situation (and almost certainly symptomatic of a system and culture which produces other, less noted, negative situations), but one which -- because of the notice is has attracted -- is likely to be net-positive for the person who was the direct victim of the initial negative consequences, and might (one hopes) raise some attention that might be directed toward dealing with the underlying problems. Its not a simple positive or negative -- it depends on what people do because of it, only some of which is now known.
- erikpukinskis 11y ago
  The public intervened, and I think it is a net positive. Bad that it happened, sad similar things happen and don't get reported on. Would do us well to try to find similar, more pernicious failures, (kinda like the FAA does when there is an accident). Glad it is getting reported on in this instance.
- jkestner 11y ago
  It depends on how this school and others change in reaction.
- wutbrodo 11y ago
  As usual, the results are positive only if your story happens to have whatever peculiar mix of characteristics make it get picked up by the media. Especially with the advent of crowdfunding, a person who's been wronged and whose story goes viral very often ends up "net positive" (e.g. the old lady chaperoning a bus who was verbally abused by her students and ended up having strangers send her almost half a million dollars. The far more important subtext (and the reason that most of these stories take off) is that they are often indicative of larger phenomena. Most kids facing racism or having their creativity stifled by their schools _don't_ have their stories blow up and so their stories are nothing but "net negative".
rayiner 11y ago
When I was in HS, I did Bot Ball. Our robot was powered by a HandyBoard, which definitely looks like a bomb: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:HandyBoard_GJP.jpg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:HandyBoard_GJP.jpg. Remember going through the airport with it on the way to finals, joking around about how it looked like a bomb. Didn't get in any trouble despite being brown. And it wasn't just us--thousands of kids did school projects with the HandyBoard over the years. It was very popular. I'm tempted to believe that people are just dumber than they were when I was a kid, but the truth is that this sort of thing is a freak accident. A hundred kids bring something like this into school and it's virtually guaranteed that one will eventually hit school administrators that are low on the bell curve. Also, I'm seeing a lot of "Texas" in comments to this story. It's really unfair. I'm here in the DC metro surrounded by highly educated latte liberals, and they're some of the most paranoid parents in the country. Don't think for a second this wouldn't happen in, e.g., Silver Spring (where those parents got CPS called on them for letting their kids walk home from school).
- JamesBarney 11y ago
  I don't think people are dumber now. They're just scared of different things. This generation has the boogie man of terrorism, and last generations had DnD and Satanism.
  - bduerst 11y ago
    Pretty much, a definite side effect of the "Security Theater". I wonder what the next trendy irrational fear will be - GMO food?
- notNow 11y ago
  I guess your HS days were in the period of pre 9/11, right? It is not about race or skin color. The kid was arrested because he's a Muslims and Muslim terrorists are wreaking havoc around the world and he was profiled and treated unjustly because of this, don't you agree?
bedhead 11y ago
The mayor still stands by police. Madness, pure madness. Public officials, more and more, are a self-selecting group populated only by some of our worst thinkers.
dang 11y ago
When a story has already had major attention on HN (which this one has: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10226196 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10226196), we treat follow-up posts as dupes unless they add significant new information. https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=comment&query=by:dang%20%22significant%20new%20information%22 https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&date...
- scott_karana 11y ago
  Maybe the original article has expanded, but this seems to have more information to me: his invitation to the whitehouse, the fact that the mayor stands by the police, and that he is still suspended and will change school.
  - minimaxir 11y ago
    While interesting, I wouldn't consider those things "significant", especially as they have been covered in the comments in linked thread anyways.
    - scott_karana 11y ago
      I guess your first point's fair, but not everyone reads the comments. (Oh, who am I kidding! ;))
      - kbenson 11y ago
        For the first few months I used HN I didn't read the comments. Now, occasionally I just read the comments and don't read the article, if there's an interesting thread that sidetracks me that doesn't really require knowledge of the article.
  - austenallred 11y ago
    My apologies; I submitted this one because there was a press conference with a lot of new info that came out, not covered in the other story or in the comments: Specifically that he wasn't going to go back to the school, that he was suspended, and that he had been interrogated without his parents present.
jasonjei 11y ago
I left a voicemail at 972-600-5000 (school district hotline) to voice my discontent.

159 points by austenallred 11y ago

vishaldpatel 11y ago

Dear Texas, we'll happily take your unwanted geniuses. Best Wishes, - California.

unethical_ban 11y ago
Dear Mr Patel, Take the reddit stereotypes back to reddit. -Smart, civic Texan with smart Texan friends.
- rblatz 11y ago
  Uh, if you were so smart you'd understand that this is in response to a school in Texas badly handling a smart kid doing smart kid things. Has any high level official in Texas apologized, or said anything decrying this student's treatment? If not, then it seems like Texas is standing behind this.
  - MrZongle2 11y ago
    I don't recall any Texan politicians decrying cannibalism today, either. I guess we know what that means, right? Or we could assume for a moment that not every event requires a politician's commentary. I didn't need to see Obama or Zuck's responses before I had determined (for myself! Imagine!) that the school's actions were absurd, overblown, and counter-productive. Perhaps you should do some research as to the response of some Texans to this travesty (e.g. http://motherboard.vice.com/read/dallas-hackers-are-already-helping-ahmed-mohamed-with-his-next-inventions http://motherboard.vice.com/read/dallas-hackers-are-already-... ) before you resort to the tired "Texas means backward and stupid" meme.
    - niccaluim 11y ago
      Nor have they decried ten-foot-tall lizard men, but then there aren't any national stories about ten-foot-tall lizard men in Texas right now, are there? The President commented on this, fer chrissakes. I think a few remarks from Texas politicians are warranted.
      - MrZongle2 11y ago
        No, action from Texas educators is warranted: specifically, actions that acknowledge that what happened to this 14-year-old is incompatible with a positive learning environment and a commitment to education and actions to ensure it doesn't happen again. A pox on the politicians. They'll spin this eight ways to Sunday and nothing will be accomplished.
    - braythwayt 11y ago
      > not every event requires a politician's commentary. No, not every event. Just the ones that give the impression that there is an ongoing systemic abuse of the very rights and principles that America is founded on. The fact that you brush this off as unimportant is exactly the problem here.
      - MrZongle2 11y ago
        "The fact that you brush this off as unimportant is exactly the problem here." And how does "absurd, overblown, and counter-productive" (my words) translate into "unimportant"? The words of politicians are generally unimportant, as they are easy to come by and seldom backed by action. That was my point. Must I too engage in today's Two Minutes' Hate to pacify the Outrage Patrol?
  - amyjess 11y ago
    Nah, it's just Irving that's a shithole. Most of the cities around it are fine, including Dallas proper. Last year, an article about the least LGBT-friendly places in the US was published [0]. Irving landed at #2. That same article mentioned that Dallas proper was one of the most LGBT-friendly places in the US. It's not much of a stretch to say that this applies not just to LGBT people but to all kinds of people that the crazy right-wing fundamentalists dislike, including smart people and Muslims. From my personal observation having lived in Dallas and Richardson all my life, I can vouch for this. It's widely acknowledged here that Dallas is a very progressive city and that Irving is a shithole. Besides, most of our tech industry is concentrated in Richardson [1]. Between UTD, TI, and the Telecom Corridor, Richardson is a pretty damn good place to be if you're smart. [0] http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/11/22/247-wall-st-lgbt-cities/19354553/ http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/11/22/247-... [1] Richardson is a suburb to the northeast of Dallas in the same way that Irving is a suburb to the northwest of Dallas, so it's a pretty apt comparison. Actually, Dallas is kind of shaped like Godzilla: on a map of city limits, Richardson and Irving look like they sit on Dallas's shoulders (though Irving is kinds leaning off the edge).
    - rblatz 11y ago
      I live in Arizona, so I understand living in an area that is nationally famous for being a bit backwards. Parts of Texas are absolutely amazing, just like here in Arizona. But we both are paying the price for our states' having a poor reputation.
    - ashwinaj 11y ago
      > It's not much of a stretch to say that this applies not just to LGBT people but to all kinds of people that the crazy right-wing fundamentalists dislike, including smart people and Muslims. From my personal observation having lived in Dallas and Richardson all my life, I can vouch for this My general observation as an outsider in Texas (Dallas 3 years and Austin 4 years) is way off from yours. It's not a question about right wing hatred, that's just hyperbole. There is an attitude in Texas where if "you aren't one of us", you don't belong here (in a subtle way). That in my opinion is undeniable. I bet if this incident was at Highland park, the result would be the same.
  - arcseco 11y ago
    The comment was a sarcastic joke and did not further the discussion. I like that HN is a community that tries to promote insightful comments and not jokes to the top of the comment page.
- ossreality 11y ago
  Did you just miss the point then? I think the point was "Texas politicians will stifle the youth and further, stifle innovation at large". Maybe try to see the merit in someone else's post instead of being butthurt. No one cares where you're from, soryr.
0xdeadbeefbabe 11y ago
California might be confusing enthusiasm for genius.
- lazaroclapp 11y ago
  Perhaps, but one can indeed go very far before the distinction even becomes relevant...
- zbyte64 11y ago
  One precedes the other.
  - 0xdeadbeefbabe 11y ago
    California and confusion?
kawliga 11y ago
He disassembled a clock and then reassembled it inside a case that resembled a bomb (however hollywood-esque it may seem). The kid might be "smart" but I wouldn't jump to the "genius" conclusion.
- cheald 11y ago
  Homemade electronics are pretty fragile. A hardshell case is entirely appropriate for transporting such a project.
  - duskwuff 11y ago
    My understanding is that the police put it in that case to take pictures.
    - kawliga 11y ago
      http://i.imgur.com/jGZ8RBU.jpg http://i.imgur.com/jGZ8RBU.jpg
wehrmachtenvy 11y ago
Maybe he can fix California's water and budget problems. The geniuses there now can't.
- yellowapple 11y ago
  Less "can't" and more "won't". A lot of the most water-wasteful crops (like almonds) might as well be staple foods in your average rich-Californian diet.
bduerst 11y ago
They'll still stand out, seeing as they probably have all their vaccinations :)
- api 11y ago
  So you're saying California needs more geniuses then?
bruceb 11y ago
What makes you think he is a genius?

lazaroclapp 11y ago

Good for whichever school he chooses to go to! Any announcement on that yet, or is he waiting for his letters of admission and full scholarship to all the top private schools in the country? ;)

infamouscow 11y ago
He's 14.
freehunter 11y ago
I'm not sure top private schools would just hand out full rides to a high school student who built a clock... if they do, I went to a really shitty school for nothing.
- lazaroclapp 11y ago
  Neither would you normally get invited to the White House or Facebook HQ for building a clock. But he should definitely take advantage of the 15 min of fame to go to the best place possible. And I mean top private high schools, not necessarily college yet. Pretty sure anyone who builds interesting science projects while in a clearly unsupportive environment would thrive at a top level STEM high-school.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
austenallred 11y ago
He said during the presser he wants to go to MIT

jotux 11y ago

Picture of the clock the kid made: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CPCXrKUVEAApkmV.jpg https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CPCXrKUVEAApkmV.jpg

DanBC 11y ago
the fucking giant 7 segment LED doesn't make you think "clock"? Or at least "no idiot would put a ridiculously large flashing display on a bomb"? I mean, he probably needs a bit of advice about mains wiring and safety. He can probably get that when he's being shown the Mars rovers (or any of the other stuff kind NASA people have invited him to) http://www.cbc.ca/news/trending/ahmed-mohamed-arrested-clock-bomb-1.3230261 http://www.cbc.ca/news/trending/ahmed-mohamed-arrested-clock... EDIT (after several comments) I mistakenly thought this was a briefcased sized case, but it's not, it's much smaller. There's a battery connector for scale. So, I shouldn't have said "fucking huge LED". It's just normal size LED clock.
- austenallred 11y ago
  He's 14 years old. He'll figure it out.
- nak_attack 11y ago
  That's exactly what made it look like a bomb to the dumbass principal: > The principal threatened to expel him if he didn’t make a written statement, he said. > “They were like, ‘So you tried to make a bomb?’” Ahmed said. > “I told them no, I was trying to make a clock.” > “He said, ‘It looks like a movie bomb to me.’”
- beat 11y ago
  Bombs on tv ALWAYS have giant flashing 7 segment LEDs counting down to the time when the white male American hero disarms them.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- rnovak 11y ago
  I think the biggest thing that says not a bomb was that he asked permission _before_ bringing it in[1]. [1]https://twitter.com/AnneClaireCNN/status/644158607035133952 https://twitter.com/AnneClaireCNN/status/644158607035133952

wheaties 11y ago

This is going to be one hell of a college letter. You know, the one that all colleges ask you write? He could write it today or he could wait to write it after he met the President.

smpetrey 11y ago

If this kid applies to the University of North Texas TAMS program... he has the highest letter of recommendation coming his way from not only the POTUS but Zuck too. http://www.theverge.com/2015/9/16/9338747/mark-zuckerberg-facebook-ahmad-mohamed-clock http://www.theverge.com/2015/9/16/9338747/mark-zuckerberg-fa...

tamstams 11y ago
An ex-admin of TAMS said that they'd love to have him.
seiji 11y ago
Your phrasing kinda implies the "Zuck" person of your sentence is more important than the "POTUS" person. Does having something happen to you instantly qualify you to receive insightful recommendation letters from strangers though? The Internet has developed an overly powerful hero amplification beam it shines down when things happen to someone, but does it necessarily reflect the person themselves? Sudden unrelenting Internet-powred fame (either as the receiver or the giver of fame) can drive some people a bit mad after the fact too.
- smtddr 11y ago
  >>Your phrasing kinda implies the "Zuck" person of your sentence is more important than the "POTUS" person. I like Obama 'n all, but in today's world of technology(this is about a student building a clock, unprompted)... I believe the opinion of Facebook's CEO tech-geek outweights Obama's.
  - waterlesscloud 11y ago
    By the time the kid graduates high school, Zuck will still be running Facebook and Obama will be just another ex-president. ;-)
  - seiji 11y ago
    I'm pretty sure looking up to anybody in management roles at Facebook is a sign of advanced mental illness.

tamstams 11y ago

My alma mater, an early college high school in the Dallas area, seems to want him. https://mobile.twitter.com/KevinRoden/status/644006028435042305 https://mobile.twitter.com/KevinRoden/status/644006028435042... Really hope it works out!

ck2 11y ago

Not that this actually matters but out of morbid curiosity - did he actually assemble a clock kit or did he simply disassemble a regular nightstand clock and put it into a little carry case? I mean it is good he is learning how things work inside but I don't think he actually made anything and actually was fooling around with an openly exposed 110VAC transformer. He definitely needs some guidance and help with this stuff before he hurts himself or burns the house down. This is like that woman at MIT who had a circuit board clipped onto her clothes and went to pick someone up at the airport and almost got murdered by security.

jotux 11y ago
Looking at the photo it looks like he put a nightstand clock into a case. I did this a lot as a kid -- removed broken stuff, poked around to fix it, glued it into a different box. It's one of the reasons I went into electrical engineering.
- ck2 11y ago
  Yeah I was fortunate to have grown up when Heathkit had stores, they blew away Radio Shack. Could never afford anything in there but the catalogs were fun to read and store was amazing to browse. It's a shame we have nothing like that today, electronics are just "magic" to people now that is made elsewhere.
mindslight 11y ago
Playing is an important part of learning. When you're young is a great time to get shocked by 170v. Better than the rectified 340v from the caps in a power supply.
Vivtek 11y ago
Given that the original freakout on the part of the English teacher was precipitated by the alarm going off while the clock was in his bag, I'm thinking it was battery-powered, not plugged in. Power cords are cheap, easily accessible wire that are not necessarily always carrying grid voltage. Although that picture certainly shows a plug, so who knows? I do wonder how the alarm went off - if that isn't just embellishment after the fact. That said, I certainly fooled around with live power when I was his age. The house didn't burn down because we had a competent electrician install circuit breakers when we built it.

rblatz 11y ago

Hopefully the town remembers this next time they vote for their school board. The principal and the superintendent are answerable to these elected people, and almost no one cares who wins.

kaonashi 11y ago
They're probably still punishing him because of the voters in the district, not despite them.
- beat 11y ago
  Sad but true.

beat 11y ago

Lucky boy, to have parents so committed and willing to stand by him, and help him grow into his talent. Unlucky boy, to have to do it in a place filled with bigots and morons. On the other hand, this kind of setback builds character. It teaches clever children of the tyranny of petty adults with petty authority, so they know what to distrust, and what to not become themselves.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

nak_attack 11y ago

I don't see anything on this page referring to the student remaining suspended.

coldcode 11y ago

I am (yet again) embarrassed to be from Texas. If you read what Steve Jobs did in high school, if that was today and he was Muslim, he'd never started Apple. Here we are looking at diversity in the face, a young engineer proud of his learning, and the hicks in Irving brand him as the next Osama. That stupid mayor's tweet is classic.

revelation 11y ago

This is of course the instinctive response of all small-minded persons challenged in their "authority". In the face of opposition, never change course! It's the ultimate downfall of bureaucracy, humans will burn down the world before admitting their mistakes.

Xyik 11y ago

This is ridiculously overblown. Glad to see people defending him and righting a wrong, but all of this is going to inflate his head.

moinnadeem 11y ago
I disagree. He seems level-headed and focused enough that he could take this as motivation. If he was arrogant, he would have capitalized on it, created a social media account and a gofundme. He seems humble to me. Source: 17-year old who faced similar media attention, it did inflate my ego a bit despite attempts to remain humble.

gyardley 11y ago

So, should we consider this event a net negative because this poor teenager got perp walked by a bunch of people who were quite likely racist and apparently too dumb to tell a circuit board from a bomb? Or should we consider this event a net positive because he's almost certainly going to end up at a much better high school after getting to meet the president and Mark Zuckerberg? On the one hand, no one should have to go through what he did. On the other hand, the fourteen-year-old version of me would've happily put himself in handcuffs for a chance at getting out of my cow-town high school.

dragonwriter 11y ago
Its a negative situation (and almost certainly symptomatic of a system and culture which produces other, less noted, negative situations), but one which -- because of the notice is has attracted -- is likely to be net-positive for the person who was the direct victim of the initial negative consequences, and might (one hopes) raise some attention that might be directed toward dealing with the underlying problems. Its not a simple positive or negative -- it depends on what people do because of it, only some of which is now known.
erikpukinskis 11y ago
The public intervened, and I think it is a net positive. Bad that it happened, sad similar things happen and don't get reported on. Would do us well to try to find similar, more pernicious failures, (kinda like the FAA does when there is an accident). Glad it is getting reported on in this instance.
jkestner 11y ago
It depends on how this school and others change in reaction.
wutbrodo 11y ago
As usual, the results are positive only if your story happens to have whatever peculiar mix of characteristics make it get picked up by the media. Especially with the advent of crowdfunding, a person who's been wronged and whose story goes viral very often ends up "net positive" (e.g. the old lady chaperoning a bus who was verbally abused by her students and ended up having strangers send her almost half a million dollars. The far more important subtext (and the reason that most of these stories take off) is that they are often indicative of larger phenomena. Most kids facing racism or having their creativity stifled by their schools _don't_ have their stories blow up and so their stories are nothing but "net negative".

rayiner 11y ago

When I was in HS, I did Bot Ball. Our robot was powered by a HandyBoard, which definitely looks like a bomb: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:HandyBoard_GJP.jpg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:HandyBoard_GJP.jpg. Remember going through the airport with it on the way to finals, joking around about how it looked like a bomb. Didn't get in any trouble despite being brown. And it wasn't just us--thousands of kids did school projects with the HandyBoard over the years. It was very popular. I'm tempted to believe that people are just dumber than they were when I was a kid, but the truth is that this sort of thing is a freak accident. A hundred kids bring something like this into school and it's virtually guaranteed that one will eventually hit school administrators that are low on the bell curve. Also, I'm seeing a lot of "Texas" in comments to this story. It's really unfair. I'm here in the DC metro surrounded by highly educated latte liberals, and they're some of the most paranoid parents in the country. Don't think for a second this wouldn't happen in, e.g., Silver Spring (where those parents got CPS called on them for letting their kids walk home from school).

JamesBarney 11y ago
I don't think people are dumber now. They're just scared of different things. This generation has the boogie man of terrorism, and last generations had DnD and Satanism.
- bduerst 11y ago
  Pretty much, a definite side effect of the "Security Theater". I wonder what the next trendy irrational fear will be - GMO food?
notNow 11y ago
I guess your HS days were in the period of pre 9/11, right? It is not about race or skin color. The kid was arrested because he's a Muslims and Muslim terrorists are wreaking havoc around the world and he was profiled and treated unjustly because of this, don't you agree?

bedhead 11y ago

The mayor still stands by police. Madness, pure madness. Public officials, more and more, are a self-selecting group populated only by some of our worst thinkers.

dang 11y ago

When a story has already had major attention on HN (which this one has: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10226196 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10226196), we treat follow-up posts as dupes unless they add significant new information. https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=comment&query=by:dang%20%22significant%20new%20information%22 https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&date...

scott_karana 11y ago
Maybe the original article has expanded, but this seems to have more information to me: his invitation to the whitehouse, the fact that the mayor stands by the police, and that he is still suspended and will change school.
- minimaxir 11y ago
  While interesting, I wouldn't consider those things "significant", especially as they have been covered in the comments in linked thread anyways.
  - scott_karana 11y ago
    I guess your first point's fair, but not everyone reads the comments. (Oh, who am I kidding! ;))
    - kbenson 11y ago
      For the first few months I used HN I didn't read the comments. Now, occasionally I just read the comments and don't read the article, if there's an interesting thread that sidetracks me that doesn't really require knowledge of the article.
- austenallred 11y ago
  My apologies; I submitted this one because there was a press conference with a lot of new info that came out, not covered in the other story or in the comments: Specifically that he wasn't going to go back to the school, that he was suspended, and that he had been interrogated without his parents present.

jasonjei 11y ago

I left a voicemail at 972-600-5000 (school district hotline) to voice my discontent.