The Knuckleheads of the Day award

Today's winners are Tri-Valley High School Principal Robert Worden and security guards Mike Bunce and David Drown. They get the award for the following.

Grahamsville — As New York City TV station satellite trucks gathered outside Tri-Valley High School yesterday, the district administration hunkered down.

ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox were there because they had heard about protests students had staged after they heard a security guard had asked a girl if she had her period. Kids wore tampons and maxi pads on their clothes. Girls fashioned tampon boxes into necklaces or purses.

Parents got angry.

It all started with the high school's new policy banning backpacks or any bag large enough to hold a textbook from the hallways, except at the start and end of the day.

Last week, high school Principal Robert Worden and security guards Mike Bunce and David Drown went around to classes. They called students with bags into the hall and asked them to stow the bags in their lockers. But one girl, Samantha Martin, 14, a freshman, says Bunce told her she couldn't carry a purse unless she had her period — and then he asked The Question: "Do you have your period?"

Kids and parents believe a few other girls also were asked The Question.

Vern Lindquist, whose daughter, Hannah, 14, spoke to Worden on behalf of her classmates, said he talked to the city media to make sure parents and school officials weren't portrayed "as gap-toothed yokels."

"The administration needed to do something, and they didn't, and this is what happens," he said of the media circus.

Superintendent Nancy George vowed Thursday to talk to parents and students. The media frenzy put a damper on that.

"I have not talked to parents today. I'm sure that there's probably messages waiting for me," a weary George said yesterday. "We'll follow every lead, speak to every student that wants to talk to us, staff members. We'll make a decision when we've heard from all sides."

Administrators need to take action. Namely fire Bunce and Drown. Whether a student is menstruating or not, its none of their business. Bunce, who had to resign from the local police because of his running a private business while on public time, has no business working for a school system. Let him work overnight security where he has public contact.

Students are protesting what was done, including a streaker, now its time for administrators act. First, I make Tri-Valley High School Principal Robert Worden and security guards Mike Bunce and David Drown today's Knuckleheads of the Day. Put that on your resume guys.

Linked to- Adam, Cao, Leaning Straight Up, Morewhat, Outside the Beltway, Perri Nelson, Pirate's Cove, Right Voices, Rosemary, Samantha Burns, Webloggin, Yankee Sailor,