One of the students said in another report that she was not given the opportunity to put away her phone before she was booted. As a parent of a teenager, I believe I recognize that moment: the authority figure has politely and repeatedly asked the teenager to do something, then takes action when ignored. And the teenager says, "Why didn't you *say* something!"

I hope this is a lesson to these teens. The Rabbi seems to be doing his best to prevent that from happening.

That's one (good) thing about Southwest, they take appropriate action, and then refuse to apologise to rude or disruptive customers.

I have been flying alone since I was twelve years old. What 17-18 year old needs to be told to sit down in an airplane for take off?

Just a guess, but if this was a school trip, the kids and chaperones were not priority passengers on Southwest, and would have not had a priority pick of their seats.

There were probably doing what teenagers with poor supervision do best, which is failing to just find a place and sit down. They were probably so busy arranging themselves into social groups, and trying to bully frequent fliers to "move" so that they could all sit together, that they were taxing everyone's patience and delaying the plane.

Whither your chaperones, rabbi?

Per the article: "At least one [student] sent a barrage of Twitter messages to media organisations, complaining that the way they were being treated was a 'scandal.'"

Translation: "I was publicly embarrassed for acting like a jackass. The horror!"

Requiring teenagers to sit down and shut up = treating them like terrorists.

http://www.cnn.com/2013/06/03/us/new-york-students-off-plane

Student Jonathan Zehavi said he felt they were targeted because they are an identifiably Jewish group. "They treated us like we were terrorists; I've never seen anything like it. I'm not someone to make these kinds of statements," Zehavi said. "I think if it was a group of non-religious kids, the air stewardess wouldn't have dared to kick them off."

Another perspective:

But business passenger Brad Rinschler, who takes the commuter flight three times a month, said he saw "definitely less than eight" chaperones with the students. He saw only two adults walk off the plane with the kids. And the chaperones sat in the front of the plane, while the noisy students sat in the back. Rinschler sat in business class, he said.

He said about 10 of the more than 100 students didn't listen to the flight crew's instructions and were noisy, swapping seats to sit beside friends and using their cell phones. "They were laughing at them and ignoring them," Rinschler said of the 10 students.

The crew gave the students "multiple chances" to heed preflight instructions.

"They pilot warned them. They did not comply. They thought it was a joke. You know, it wasn't a joke," Rinschler said. "I've never seen this," he added. "It's a commuter flight. There's no families on it."

I don't know what I'd do if I was on a 4 a.m. commuter flight (!!!) and 100 kids showed up.

Finally an airline does something we can all applaud!

Now if they can just get the fat guys to stop taking half my seat, Southwest will have my undivided business for life.

having taken a trip to Europe [OI, 30 years ago now] with 30 or so of my best highschool friends and 4! chaperones... we had a fabu time, but it was still a time of yes ma'am, and no, sir. Coupled with the fact that flying like that wasn't like gettin' on a bus, as it is now.

The only thing that the air crew might'a done a bit different is to keep the chain of command intact... you don't talk to an individual student, you talk to the Rabbi and say "if you don't get your students in order, your trip will be scrubbed."

Sometimes you gotta learn the hardway, that there are times for fooling around, and times to play it straight, and getting on an airliner is not playtime.

My experience in malignant narcissism in kids is that it is usually also in the parents.

From Kevin's cnn link:
"We were more behaved than kids should be," he said.

No, if you were "polite and respectful" you were exactly as behaved as kids should be. If you were anything less than perfectly behaved, you are a disgrace to your parents, and ought to be ashamed of yourselves.
Not to mention, a least some of your group (I'd wager most since it was an end of year senior trip) were 18, and not kids, but adults.

"Southwest will have my undivided business for life."
In my office they have. Last week I overheard a colleague exclaim, "I can't believe southwest cancelled the non stop to San Jose, we might as well just drive." They even threw out taking Amtrak before taking another airline.

"Coupled with the fact that flying like that wasn't like gettin' on a bus, as it is now."

I can't believe that line of reasoning doesn't get more traction around here. When things become vulgar, people behave with vulgarity.

"Coupled with the fact that flying like that wasn't like gettin' on a bus, as it is now."

Having taken the bus a couple of times recently on one-way trips (Greyhound and Megabus), I can assure you flying is nothing like taking the bus.

The bus has large seats, plenty of legroom, doesn't charge for storage, you can bring all the "liquids" you want with you, and a stranger doesn't grab your nads before you climb aboard. Plus it's 1/10 of the cost.

Whenever I hear people compare modern air travel to bus travel, I think it's an insult to the bus.

Gang signs? Really? What, they're the OGs - of Flatbush? What a bunch of clowns. Hell's Podiatrists.

AirTran, not SouthWest. SW would not have let them get to a second warning.

llater,

llamas

"Zehavi said he felt they were targeted because they are an identifiably Jewish group"

This is worth mentioning. Outside of Islamic countries, there is virtually no discrimination against Jewish people - certain no more than against any other group. However, that doesn't stop too many members of the group from wearing their Jewishness on their sleeve, and then claiming discrimination any time things don't go their way. And wait a bit: if they don't get enough sympathy, the next step is to mention the Holocaust.

These kids need to get over themselves.

In any case, a group of 100 teenagers needs adults willing and able to make them behave in a civilized fashion. Individual teenagers are the epitomy of the saying "all of us are stupider than any of us".

And, yah, Greyhound is good. Ought to take it more often...

I believe some of those teenagers were in my hotel last night. At first I was kind of getting a kick out of their boisterous enthusiasm. But it's all fun and games until someone's room gets flooded, which is what happened to me at about 11 PM, after the overgrown infants in the room upstairs from me decided that it would be fun to let their tub overflow. At first the hotel volunteered to move me to another room, but then they told me, sorry, the hotel is full. I didn't think to point out to them that they could make some room by kicking those kids out.

P.S.: they were all girls.

having taken a trip to Europe [OI, 30 years ago now] with 30 or so of my best highschool friends and 4! chaperones... we had a fabu time, but it was still a time of yes ma'am, and no, sir.

I flew to DC in my senior year (CloseUp Foundation trip, 1991) with about 20 or so and only the teacher. We were also well behaved on the flight as well as during the tours, lectures, etc. The kids that came from Detroit (and they were all going on grants or other freebies whereas we all paid, well, my grandparents did for my graduation gift) though... oh man were they NOT well behaved. It started right on the plane (they got on during our stopover), then they did things like running around and hollering while in the capitol building and such. Really were rude and they had zero respect.

Now if they can just get the fat guys to stop taking half my seat, Southwest will have my undivided business for life.

Southwest already requires anyone that doesn't fit into a seat to purchase a 2nd ticket, which is refunded if the flight isn't full.

Gang signs? Probably about as "gangsta" as these other iPhone sissies:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/05/us/as-vandals-take-to-national-parks-some-point-to-social-media.html?ref=us&_r=0

figures they are hasids. They think they live on their own planet, immune to the rules of the rest of society.

When I went on a high school trip we required to be quite well behaved and it was well enforced.

Today I am sure we would not be allowed to fly. By our discipline they would surely figure that we were enemy soldiers disguised as students. OK, maybe not quite that...

The problem I have found with the train and greyhound is that they are just so slow...and often times inconvinent times. Plus the train rarely seems to get me that close to where I am going. Years ago I looked at taking the bus. Going by plane and renting a car when I got there was about 6 hours. The bus was 25 hours (or something like that) with a 6 hour stop-over (one bus dropped me off at midnight, the next one picked me up at 6 am or something like that.

I wonder why southwest even gave them other trips. They should have just said you are out of the flight because of bad behaviour and you just have to find your own way. I suppose the legal system of USA would have screwed them if they had not refunded the money which those brats/their school had paid. And the rabbi seems to be as bad as public school principals who does not have the spine to enforce discipline on the kids of his school. That is what happens when even so called charitable institutions start charging the moon and cater only to the super rich and not the middle classes.