Teenage chemistry enthusiast won’t be charged with felony, will go to space camp
[Via Boing Boing]

Kiera Wilmot — the Florida 16-year-old who created a small explosion just outside her school before classes started by mixing cleaning solution and tin foil (she was just curious, nobody was harmed) — will not be charged with a felony, after all. Florida State Attorneys dropped the charges against Wilmot yesterday. After her case garnered national attention, she ended up with a lawyer who has defended her mostly for free. There’s no word yet on whether she’ll be allowed to return to the school that expelled her and pressed charges in the first place.
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Not a felon. Going to Space Camp. I just love stories like this.
This shows that new communities created on the Internet can be smarter than zero-tolerance laws.
First her community expelled her, threatened to send her to jail and possible mark her as a felon for her life. For something that hurt no one, that many people have done and that was at most a poor choice – something that teenagers really should be allowed to make. Because… zero-tolerance.
But, because the internet can create ad hoc communities of real social power, with tools to affect rapid change, it did not stop there. Strangers stepped up to raise their voices and to help her. She got a good lawyer to step up. The social pushback stopped the previous process and allowed cooler, smarter decisions to be made.
And what is really great is people did more than just raise their voices. There are tools to allow them to put their money where their mouth is.
So a fund was created to pay for her defense. Over $8000 was raised. After any remaining legal expenses are paid for, the money will be used in a trust for her education.
However the really great thing was started by Homer Hickam, the former NASA engineer whose story is told in October Sky – he built rockets as a teenager, really high powered ones. It would not be surprising to have seen him put in a similar position today as Kiera.
Homer set up a crowdfunding project to send Kiera and her sister to Space Camp! More than enough money has been rasied to send them. Homer just added this:
We have the girls scheduled now, their tuition paid, their flight suits purchased, and nearly everything arranged. They’re excited and so are we!
What a great story. Instead of destroying this girl’s life, the community actually taught the lesson it needed to (get some oversight before any science work, just to double check?) and then provided her opportunities she did not even have before.
And the rapidity at which this happened demonstrates that we are beginning to create the social norms to balance safety to a community vs freedom for the individual.
Instead of going to jail, Kiera is going to learn about space. Amazing.
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