SRO in Schools Constituent Concern
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NAME CONCERN KEEP or REMOVE OTHER Megan Berger Attached please find testimony from the Coalition to Reform School Discipline supporting the resolution before the Prince George’s County Board of Education to REMOVE remove school resource officers from Prince George’s County Public Schools. Thank you, Megan Berger, J.D. Staff Attorney Disability Rights Maryland, formerly Maryland Disability Law Center 1500 Union Ave., Suite 2000; Baltimore, MD 21211 443-692-2504 ATTACHMENT Comments to the Prince George’s County Board of Education June 11, 2020 RE: Support for removal of school resource officers from Prince George’s County Public Schools The Maryland Coalition to Reform School Discipline (“CRSD”) brings together advocates, service providers, and concerned community members interested in transforming school discipline practices within Maryland’s public school systems. We are committed to making discipline responsive to students’ behavioral needs, fair, appropriate to the infraction, and designed to keep youth on track to graduate. CRSD supports the resolution before the Prince George’s County Board of Education to remove School Resource Officers (SROs) from schools. CRSD believes this resolution is necessary to protect against the funneling of students into the school-to-prison pipeline and to eliminate the disproportionate impact of exclusionary discipline practices and police contact on Black students and students with disabilities. Current school discipline and arrest data for PGCPS is alarming. PGCPS has the second highest number of student arrests by SROs in the state. For the 2017-2018 school year, PGCPS SROs arrested 350 students.1 While PGCPS is one of our state’s largest school districts, its arrest numbers are significantly higher than even the other large districts. Montgomery County Public Schools – the largest school district in Maryland – had 226 student arrests, and Baltimore City Public Schools had only 60 student arrests.2 Of the 350 PGCPS students that experienced a school-based arrest, 301 (86%) were Black and 98 (28%) were students with Individualized Education Plans (“IEPs”). PGCPS also consistently removes more students from school through suspension and expulsion than any other district in Maryland, and its disciplinary practices disproportionately impact students of color and students with disabilities.3 Although Black students do not misbehave more often than white students, Black students are more often disciplined and bear the brunt of harsh, exclusionary punishment.4 Maryland enrollment and discipline data for the 2018-2019 school year shows that while Black students accounted for only 57% of student enrollment in the 1 “Maryland Public Schools Arrest Data, School Year 2017-18,” p. 89, http://marylandpublicschools.org/about/Documents/DSFSS/SSSP/StudentArrest/MarylandPublicSchoolsArrestData SY20172018.pdf. 2 Id. at p. 6. 3 “Suspensions, Expulsions, and Health Related Exclusions 2018-2019,” http://www.marylandpublicschools.org/about/Documents/DCAA/SSP/20182019Student/2019SuspensionsExpulsion sHRExc.pdf. 4 See Russell Skiba, Ph. D. & Natasha T. Williams, Are Black Kids Worse? Myths and Facts about Racial Iyalya Gilgeous DifferencesThis is the dumbest in Behavior—A idea yet. Summary We need of those the Literature, officers to Equityprotect Project our children. at Ind. What’sUniv. (Mar. to happen 2014), when there’s another active shooter in the schools? the students will KEEP just have to sit and wait to be slaughtered like sheep. http://www.indiana.edu/~atlantic/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/African American- Differential- Behavior_031214.pdf.At least with the SRO in place, they’ll have a chance at survival with the armed officer there to flush out the shooter(s). This is our new reality. school shootings occur. We must protect the children. They have the right to feel safe at home and school, period! 2 county, 77% of students experiencing out-of-school removal in PGCPS were Black students. Diana Konohia Similarly,Good Afternoon, students with IEPs accounted for only 11% of enrollment, but 23% of students KEEP removed. TheI am disproportionatesending this email and in highresponse rate of to student the proposal arrests that by theSROs Board in PGCPS is putting is harmfulforward to ourremove youth SRO's from Prince George's County Public Schools. I am vehemently andopposed directly to makingcontributes this toproposal the school to remove to prison the pipeline. SROs at The this mere time frompresence our schools. of SROs in schools dramatically increases the frequency with which students become involved with the criminal or juvenileMy son whojustice is asystem graduating for low-level senior of offenses Oxon Hill like High fighting School and was disorderly a sophomore conduct.5 when For a example:student was SHOT in the school's parking lot. We have had issues with a gang A study presence, of 13 schoolsand the schoolwith an has SRO had and to 15go schoolson lockdown without a fewone times found during that schools his tenure with due to crimes in the neighborhood surrounding the school building. The theSROs SRO presence had nearly assists five intimes protecting the number and ensuring of arrests the for safety disorderly of our conduct students as and schools improves response times in the event of an emergency. As a parent, their presence withouthas reassured an SRO.6 me that my son and all of the other students at Oxon Hill were safe. If you remove the SROs who will be responsible for the safety of our children? As it standsSchools now with there SROs is oftenmay alsonot enough be more of likely a police/SRO to report non-seriouspresence during violent our incidents after school to the activities. This school year our PTSA had to go to the local police policedepartment (e.g., tophysical ask them attack to put or fightsin roaming without patrols a weapon to keep and watch threat over of physical our school attack and students during the hours after school. We are always underfunded as it withoutpertains a to weapon) our school than security. schools lacking SROs.7 In New York City in 2012, 70% of arrests in public schools were for misdemeanors and 4%This for entire even proposal lesser violations.8 seems nothing more than a political show accompanied by a knee jerk reaction to gain political capital during a trying time in our country. Why Highernow? Have arrest you rates EVER in schools expressed with SROsa concern do not about indicate it before the today.need for As a Ipolice walk thepresence halls of in Oxon order Hill to as I frequently do, I have NEVER felt as though the students were ensureover policed. student This safety Board at school. needs toRather, take a they step reflect back andschool have districts’ further reliance discussions on SROs with communityto address members, teachers and experts to make sure that our children are routinesafe and behavior nurtured. issues The thattwo canarise coexist. in schools. As a result, SROs react and respond to students engaged in everyday behaviors that are consistent with adolescent development and that do not poseThis needs a safety to riskbe a to thoughtful themselves, process other that students, includes or schoolall interested personnel. persons Unsurprisingly, to make an theseinformed law decision with sweeping reform. What impact would this removal have enforcementon our children's interactions safety? Willwith we schoolchildren be in compliance are linked with theinextricably Maryland to Safe race, To as Learn “schools Act? with Are you ready for the backlash if something happens to one of our higherchildren? percentages I am requesting of [B]lack the andBoard [Latinx] table studentsthis conversation are more until likely a tocomprehensive employ school plan resource can be developed to deal with the concerns of EVERYONE that would be officers.”9affected by Students such a policy with disabilities change. Thank are also you at for risk your of increasedconsideration interactions and giving with me law a voiceenforcement to express my concerns. when police are present in schools. According to data from the U.S. Department of Education’s 2015-16 Civil Rights Data Collection, students with disabilities are 2.9% more likely to be arrested than students without disabilities when police are present in schools.10 The impacts of these interactions are far reaching and life altering. Research shows that even one instance of police contact increases the likelihood that a young person will have further involvement with the justice system, fall behind, and/or ultimately drop out of school.11 In 5 DIGNITY IN SCHOOLS CAMPAIGN, A RESOURCE GUIDE ON COUNSELORS NOT COPS (September 2016), http://www.dignityinschools.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Resource_Guide-on-CNC-1.pdf. 6 Id. 7 Id. 8 Id. 9 Kristin Henning, Boys to Men: The Role of Policing in the Socialization of Black Boys, in POLICING THE BLACK MAN 67 (Angela J. Davis ed., 2017) (citation omitted). See U.S. DEP’T OF EDUCATION, OFFICE OF CIVIL RIGHTS, 2013-2014 CIVIL RIGHTS DATA COLLECTION: A FIRST LOOK 5 (2016) (greater percentage of high schools with “high [B]lack and [Latinx] student enrollment” have sworn law enforcement officers, including SROs, than other high schools), https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/docs/2013-14-first-look.pdf. 10 ACLU, COPS AND NO COUNSELORS: HOW THE LACK OF MENTAL HEALTH STAFF IS HARMING STUDENTS 23 (March 2019), https://www.aclu.org/sites/default/files/field_document/030419-acluschooldisciplinereport.pdf. 11 Stephanie Ann Wiley, The Amplification of Deviance Following Police Contact: An Examination of Individual and Neighborhood Factors among a Sample of Youth, 35 (July 2, 2014). 3 addition, student contact with SROs shapes their outlook on law enforcement, laws, and rules, as they “perceive their oppressive interactions with SROs as representative of how all [police] officers will treat them.”12 Members of CRSD have seen first-hand the negative effect that SRO interactions have on the students we work with whose lives have been harmed and irreparably altered by arrests and police contact in PGCPS.