Defunding / abolishing school police (consolidated thread)

How school systems make criminals of Black youth

As support for the Black Lives Matter movement has surged in recent weeks and anti-Black racism reading lists have flooded the internet, education scholar Subini Ancy Annamma noticed a particular issue missing from many of them: the role school systems play in making criminals of Black youth. So Annamma, an associate professor at Stanford Graduate School of Education (GSE), put together and shared a list of her own. "Education has a reckoning to do," she wrote, linking to dozens of books and articles about ways in which schools systematically perpetuate the criminalization of young students of color, especially Black boys ...

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https://phys.org/news/2020-06-school-criminals-black-youth.html

 

Calls to defund police shine light on the school-to-prison pipeline

As calls to defund police departments in the United States continue to spread in the wake of George Floyd's death, an offshoot message has gained traction as well: remove officers from schools. Several districts around the country have either severed ties or considered severing ties with law enforcement amidst the protests, including Minneapolis, where Floyd died. Those in support of the idea say that police in schools have strengthened the school-to-prison pipeline -- a concept that suggests when police are in schools, there is an increase of criminalization or severity in student discipline. Denise C. Gottfredson, a criminal justice and ...

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https://abcnews.go.com/US/calls-defund-police-shine-light-school-prison-pipeline/story?id=71195676

 

L.A. school board to consider phasing out school police under intensifying demands

The Los Angeles Board of Education next week will consider phasing out the school police, essentially eliminating the department over the next four years, a proposal that comes after more than a week of intensifying demands to do so by student advocacy groups and the leadership of the teachers union. Two other competing school board resolutions also call for a review of police operations, but not an outright termination of the department. The proposal to eliminate the department over time is being brought forward by Monica Garcia, the board’s longest serving member, as an emergency motion, to bypass the normal ...

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https://ktla.com/news/local-news/l-...out-school-police-under-intensifying-demands/

 

Detroit School District Faces Calls To Eliminate Funding For Its Police Force

The Detroit school district is under pressure to dismantle its police department, with advocates saying that armed officers create a climate of intimidation. "When I walk into my school I'm greeted by metal detectors and security guards. I automatically feel like I've done something wrong," said Emily Wilson, a senior at Cass Technical High School in Detroit. "The district has a misguided notion that the district police will keep us safe." She said the money should be spent on guidance counselors and building maintenance instead. That's why the education advocacy group 482Forward recently launched a campaign for the district to ...

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https://patch.com/michigan/detroit/...aces-calls-eliminate-funding-its-police-force

 

Public support overwhelming at Red Clay meeting to replace school resource officers with counselors, psychologists

Sascha Bretzger, a recent graduate of the Charter School of Wilmington in Red Clay, remembers being a junior when armed law enforcement officers started showing up at schools in response to school shootings nationwide. "Having an armed officer roaming around the halls did not make any student feel safer," she said. "I remember having so many conversations with fellow students and my peers about how it put us on edge, and I was in a school that did not have a majority black student body. It was majority white and Asian, and so we would not have been the typical ...

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https://www.wdel.com/public-support...cle_0ce33e96-b18e-11ea-9a95-b73bcab00bd7.html

 

Why It Is Time to Remove Police from Schools

The presence of police officers risks disrupting supportive environments where all students feel comfortable learning. The recent wave of Black Lives Matter protests has demanded that societies pay closer attention to the way racism shapes lives. While standing in solidarity with Black people in the US, protesters in the UK have been clear that much greater attention needs to be paid to racism in the UK. The protests have sparked critical conversations about policing and the way policing affects Britain’s Black communities. This includes the presence of police in UK schools. My research, published this week by the Runnymede Trust, ...

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https://nationalinterest.org/blog/reboot/why-it-time-remove-police-schools-162999

 

Students At Mostly Black NYC Schools More Likely To Have Negative Feelings About School Police

Students at predominantly Black New York City schools are significantly less likely to have a positive view of school police or to believe school discipline is applied fairly, according to a new analysis of school survey data. Yet across the city’s schools, large majorities of students, parents, and teachers agree that school safety agents help keep schools safe and respectful. At schools where fewer than 20% of students are Black, 83% agree on average that school safety agents “promote a safe and respectful environment at this school.” But at schools where more than 80% of students are Black, that falls ...

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https://gothamist.com/news/students...ly-have-negative-feelings-about-school-police

 

Students At Mostly Black NYC Schools More Likely To Have Negative Feelings About School Police

Students at predominantly Black New York City schools are significantly less likely to have a positive view of school police or to believe school discipline is applied fairly, according to a new ...

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https://gothamist.com/news/students-mostly-black-nyc-schools-more-likely-have-negative-feelings-about-school-police?ref=agreatbigcity.com

 

Editorial: Want to defund police? Start in schools.

In Houston ISD, a 14-year-old student was restrained, handcuffed and pepper-sprayed by a campus police officer after throwing a single food item at lunch. In the Katy school district, a 17-year-old special needs student was shot with a stun gun six times after leaving a classroom where she was being bullied. In Dallas, a school police officer used a Taser on and handcuffed a 7-year-old who has ADHD and a mood disorder because the boy was banging his head against a wall in class. If these were your children, would you accept that kind of treatment? Would you condone any ...

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https://www.houstonchronicle.com/op...l-Stop-over-policing-our-schools-15353509.php

 

WA students don’t need cops. They need counselors, teachers and nurses

Nearly half of all public schools in the United States (48%) have an armed police officer, often referred to as a school resource officer (SRO). From 1999 to 2015, the percentage of students with an SRO in their school increased from 54% to 70%. At the same time, the number of school counselors grew only by 5%, after adjusting for growth in student enrollment. Children of color and children from low-income communities are more likely to have SROs in their schools. Since the 1999 Columbine High School shooting in Colorado, the popularity of SRO programs has steadily increased. Millions of ...

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https://crosscut.com/2020/06/wa-students-dont-need-cops-they-need-counselors-teachers-and-nurses

 

Police in Schools

I graduated from Oakland Technical High School this year. I spent 13 years as an Oakland public school student, attending Chabot Elementary School and Claremont Middle School, before attending Tech. In all of this time, I was completely unaware of the existence of an independent Oakland Schools Police Department (OSPD). The three schools I attended are among the whitest public schools in the entire district—and as a result of my own physical proximity to whiteness, I gained access to resources, coursework and support that I would not have otherwise had. Oakland Tech has a minimal police presence, especially when compared ...

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https://www.eastbayexpress.com/oakland/police-in-schools/Content?oid=30036172

 

Madison School Board to vote next week on ending police contract

The Madison School Board will decide next week whether to cancel a contract to station police officers inside its four main high schools. The district announced Wednesday the board will hold a special meeting on Monday to vote on canceling a contract with the Madison Police Department for the school resource officers, or SROs. “As leaders in education, we recognize that now is the time to intensify our commitment to dismantling systemic racism by addressing inequities that only serve as mechanisms of division, and this decision is a significant step,” School Board President Gloria Reyes said in a statement. While ...

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https://madison.com/wsj/news/local/...cle_a8abf819-6dd3-55c5-86ee-e6cffaa21bda.html

 

Natishia June: Racial disparities in Florida’s criminal justice system are shameful

The U.S. Census Bureau states that 17% of Florida citizens are Black, while the Florida Department of Corrections reports that 47% of men and women in state prisons are Black. In all 50 states, less than 14% of the population is Black, but the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics notes that 33% of the prison population nationwide is Black. The numbers don’t lie: racism and discrimination are prevalent in Florida’s criminal justice system and the disparities in Florida are greater than those across the nation. The state needs reform, not just for Black people but for many others caught in ...

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https://floridapolitics.com/archive...floridas-criminal-justice-system-are-shameful

 

Oakland moves to bar police from schools as bigger cities reject change

A growing movement to get police officers out of US schools saw a major victory this week when Oakland’s school board voted to eliminate the school district’s dedicated police department. But in Chicago and Los Angeles, despite protests by youth activists, support from teachers’ unions, and an outpouring of public support, school boards voted to keep police in public schools, at least for now. Since the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, calls to shrink police budgets and invest taxpayers’ dollars in non-violent strategies to promote public safety have gained political support across the country. Minneapolis’s city council has ...

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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/o...ls-as-bigger-cities-reject-change/ar-BB15YROi

 

Do police belong in schools? | Pro/Con

As cities across the country debate police reform in the wake of massive civil unrest following the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers, many people have questioned whether officers belong in schools. After the shooting at Parkland, Fla.’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, many people, including President Donald Trump, called for additional police officers in every school. Others, however, argue that the presence of these officials — known as school resource officers — can exacerbate existing issues, or create unintended consequences, particularly for students of color. The Inquirer turned to the American Civil Liberties Union ...

NO: Police presence exacerbates the ‘school-to-prison’ pipeline.

By Ghadah Makoshi

Police should not be in our schools. The harm caused by a police presence in schools far outweighs any arguments about the presence of police making a school safer. The acceleration of the number of students entering the so-called “school-to-prison” pipeline in recent decades makes clear the dangers of bringing police into schools.

Study after study has shown that arrest rates, particularly for Black students for minor offenses, are higher in schools that have officers, despite efforts to teach de-escalation. Arrests have terrible consequences for students. When a student is arrested, the odds of that student dropping out of high school doubles. Just a single court appearance for a student makes that student four times more likely to drop out. Those statistics bear out in real-world consequences. Just 26% of students arrested graduate from high school.

Which begs the question: If the consequences for students being arrested are so significant in shaping their young adulthood, why are police officers even in schools in the first place?

Advocates say that police presence in schools is a matter of keeping students safe.

The CDC estimates that of the total number of student deaths, less than 2% happen at schools. School shootings have occurred at schools with and without armed law enforcement officers, where sometimes they have intervened, but in most situations, for example, Columbine, Colo., and Parkland, Fla., they have not been able to stop the violence. Additionally, there is no conclusive evidence indicating that school police reduce crime among students.

And if the expectation of a police officer in a school is to intervene in deadly situations and become martyrs, then the type of people who are going to be attracted to that job are not the type of people that we want to be in charge of the safety of our students.

We want people in our schools who can interact in a compassionate way; people who understand childhood development. Schools need counselors, not police. Even the most caring and best-trained police officer cannot, and should not be expected to, operate as counselors in our schools.

A study published in Adolescent Research Review in 2016 reviewed and analyzed existing research and found that schools with police have higher rates of exclusionary discipline, such as out-of-school suspensions and expulsions, than do other comparable schools. Evidence shows that a police presence can mean increased rates of student arrests for minor offenses, such as disorderly conduct or simple assault, resulting in greater numbers of children than necessary being exposed to the justice system. Importantly, youth of color are considerably more likely than white youth to experience these harms.

Implicit bias plays a role in school discipline when students of color are seen as threatening and are disproportionately punished and arrested.

And despite good intentions, officers can make school climates less inclusive and reduce trust, which undermines effective behavior management. Student misbehavior, including criminal behavior, is less likely in schools that have inclusive social climates. These are schools where students feel valued, respected, listened to, and part of a community. These are schools with adequate support and resources for students. These are not schools that prioritize a police presence.

There is no compelling reason that justifies or excuses the harm done to our most vulnerable students with their continued presence in schools. If we are going to divest from the police, an excellent place to start would be getting police out of our schools.

Ghadah Makoshi is the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania’s community advocate focusing on school policing reform.



YES: Safety officers, replacing traditional police, will help us best serve students.

By William R. Hite Jr.

As the superintendent of the School District of Philadelphia, I believe there is a place for police in our schools, though I know reforms are needed in order to best support our students, educators, and community members.

Our Office of School Safety (OSS) stands committed to dismantling institutional racism, classism, and social injustices in our schools, communities, and nation. I, and other district leaders, recognize the critical need to recreate the district’s current school safety approach, and we will do so by cultivating a program that provides school safety officers (SSO) with the tools to understand adolescent development, trauma, and de-escalation.

As we prepare for the 2020-21 academic year, the OSS is currently reviewing and making necessary operational changes that will revamp the culture of discipline in schools, and ensure our practices and protocols align with the values of the community and show respect for our students. It is important for all us to take into account that although the majority of a school safety officer’s work occurs within school walls, the OSS has a duty to protect students, staff, and administrators from internal and external threats. This is a daily challenge, and as we reimagine the office, we must keep this critical and essential safety role in mind.

Our new safety officers are required to complete a mandated training program that includes, but is not limited to: de-escalation and conflict management, racial equity and diversity, child development, and traumatic stress in adolescents. Every year, all officers will be required to complete a series of extensive in-service and specialized trainings that instill procedurally just practices and support ever-changing school climates.

We have eliminated the title “school police” and, at the start of the year, officers will be recognized as school safety officers. The title change is in accordance with Pennsylvania’s Safe Schools Legislation, and the change allows for students to understand the responsibility of our personnel — which is to actively create a safe and supportive educational environment. Safety officers are not police officers, which means they are not armed, nor do they make arrests. Instead, they alternatively help to minimize juvenile arrests by serving as a liaison between students and the Philadelphia Police Department.

Our vision is to continue reducing the number of students being arrested. To meet this objective, the Office of School Safety will be working in collaboration with the Philadelphia Police Department’s School Diversion Unit, the Department of Human Services, and the District Attorney’s Office to significantly expand our diversion efforts to serve more students. Through this enhancement, we will gain additional insight into diversion services, streamline our processes, and expedite results. All of which would help us create a comprehensive program that deters negative contact with children.

We are also gradually phasing-out current SSO uniforms. They will be replaced with a more scaled-down and approachable, yet readily identifiable, uniform. Additionally, the current day-to-day use of metal detectors will be revised to ensure the process is conducted in a procedurally just, humane, and dignified manner.

We are developing a comprehensive communication plan focused on organizational transparency and integrity that will help build relationships and trust within the community. We will be updating our website with meaningful content that will include our training programs, code of conduct, data and reports, and other safety resources.

The district needs the OSS to help us collaborate with students, social workers, teachers, administrators, and other community organizations to ensure we are prioritizing student health and safety while promoting an enriching learning environment. We will continue to coordinate virtual meetings with youth advocacy groups to continue fostering a two-way dialogue, and give students the opportunity to be a part of the conversation and plans moving forward.

We know there is much work to be done, and we are committed to doing it with urgency, listening to feedback, and emphasizing respect for our students, staff, and school communities.

William R. Hite Jr. is the superintendent of the School District of Philadelphia.



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https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/police-reforms-school-resource-officers-20200626.html

 

Teachers union calls for elimination of LAUSD police force

The United Teachers Los Angeles union is calling for the elimination of the Los Angeles Unified School District police department, it was announced Friday, June 26. The UTLA “House of Representatives” passed a motion Thursday night to eliminate LAUSD school police and redirect funding to mental health and counseling for students, said Anna Bakalis of the union. Thursday’s UTLA House of Representatives vote was 154-56, and follows a 35-2 vote by the UTLA Board of Directors on the same motion on June 2. “The concept of police-free schools is not new,” UTLA President-elect Cecily Myart-Cruz said in a statement. “Students ...

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https://www.dailynews.com/2020/06/26/teachers-union-calls-for-elimination-of-lausd-police-force/

 

LA teachers union votes in support of eliminating LAUSD police, redirecting funds to student services

The United Teachers Los Angeles union is calling for the elimination of the Los Angeles Unified School District police department amid widespread demands for sweeping police reform across the country. In a 154-56 vote on Thursday, the UTLA House of Representatives passed a motion in support of disbanding the LAUSD school police and redirecting funds to mental health and counseling for students. "The concept of police-free schools is not new,'' UTLA President-elect Cecily Myart-Cruz said in a statement. "Students and parents have been speaking their truth for many years, oftentimes going unheard. Police presence in schools leads to negative outcomes ...

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https://abc7.com/lausd-police-defund-school-austin-beutner-la-department/6271135/

 

D.C. Council Moves to Cut Some Ties Between Police and Schools

Why is the Metropolitan Police Department in charge of security in D.C.’s traditional public schools? As calls to transform policing intensify in the wake of protests against systemic anti-Black racism and police violence, the D.C. Council is considering that question. Its Committee on Education passed a budget proposal Thursday that would make DC Public Schools responsible for security guards instead of the Metropolitan Police Department, in response to activists’ calls for police-free schools. “The safety of our students is a priority but our current staffing of schools indicates that we are more interested in policing our students than we are ...

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https://www.washingtoncitypaper.com...s-to-cut-some-ties-between-police-and-schools

 

Editorial: History shows that removing police from our schools is reckless

As protests in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer turn to “defunding” police departments and then to removing police presence from schools, we would do well ...

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https://www.abqjournal.com/1470495/history-shows-that-removing-police-from-our-schools-is-reckless.html

 

‘I’m listening to the argument that police don’t belong in schools’: Allentown and Bethlehem reconsider resource officers

For children growing up after the 1999 Columbine school shooting that left 13 people dead, seeing an armed officer patrolling the hallways is a common part of the school day. Bethlehem Area students start encountering officers in school in sixth grade. All together, the district has seven school resource officers — two at Liberty High, and one at Freedom High and each of the four middle schools. All seven wear a police uniform and carry a gun. And Superintendent Joseph Roy believes the officers, six of whom are employed by the city police department and one by Bethlehem Township, are ...

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https://www.mcall.com/news/educatio...0200627-wnyxfgu7ebfflajrpla5aepooe-story.html