I was suspended multiple times in middle school ("hacking" -- nothing had restricted permissions back in those days) and high school for being stupid and mouthi

I was suspended multiple times in middle school ("hacking" -- nothing had restricted permissions back in those days) and high school for being stupid and mouthing off to a teacher who wasn't going as fast as I wanted. I took all of the math available at my local community college ("advanced" calculus, differential equations) in sophomore and junior years of highschool, took AP CS AB senior year, got a 5 on a number of AP exams (CS AB, Chemistry, ...), graduated HS with a 3.9 (of 4.0). I am really lucky to have had a principal who was able to see past my immature behavior and strike the suspensions from my record for college applications. As a result I was directly admitted into the CS program at the U of Washington (semi-uncommon), finished undergrad in 2⅓ years, and graduated cum laude with a ~3.85 (of 4.0). Now I work at an amazing software company hacking on a really cool operating system. I can't imagine I would be in the same place making the same kind of $$$ if a zero-tolerance policy had applied at any point during my K-12 education.