[News] 20, 000 California Students Arrested or Ticketed in 2009-10, Vast Majority Are Youth of Color

[Anti-Imperialist News]

    New Report: 20,000 California Students Arrested or Ticketed in
    2009-10, Vast Majority Are Youth of Color

*http://www.thestrategycenter.org/blog/2014/03/18/new-report-20000-california-students-arrested-or-ticketed-2009-10-vast-majority-are-*
by Ashley Franklin 
<http://www.thestrategycenter.org/user/ashley-franklin> on Tuesday, 
March 18, 2014


      New Report: 20,000 California Students Arrested or Ticketed in
      2009-10, Vast Majority Are Youth of Color

*"Local Control Funding Formula" Should Strengthen Support Services, Not 
School Police, Report Says *


The New "Separate and Unequal" Using CA LCFF to Dismantle the 
School-to-Prison Pipeline 
<http://www.thestrategycenter.org/sites/www.thestrategycenter.org/files/Crystal%20McMillan/LCFF%20POLICY%20BRIEF%203-20-2014.pdf>

The Community Rights Campaign (CRC) and the Black Organizing Project 
<http://www.blackorganizingproject.org/> (based in Oakland) released a 
report that presents startling new data on the role of police officers 
in schools and the need to address this statewide problem within the new 
Local Control Funding Formula.

"The New 'Separate and Unequal': Using California's Local Control 
Funding Formula to Dismantle the School-to-Prison Pipeline" highlights 
the dramatic expansion in school police forces across the state, with 
many districts now employing more than 50 police officers. As a result, 
many schools now rely on law enforcement personnel to handle routine 
school disciplinary matters, resulting in well over 30,000 California 
students being referred to the police in just one school year. At least 
20,000 students were arrested or given a police ticket, and over 90% of 
them were youth of color.

"/This constitutes a major violation of students' civil, human, and 
educational rights, and has produced irreparable harm to students across 
California/," said Manuel Criollo, Director of Organizing at the 
Labor/Community Strategy Center. "/Los Angeles and Oakland youth have 
been leading important struggles at LAUSD and OUSD to curb the 
criminalization of students in school, now we want to open up the debate 
to build the schools our youth deserve and start funding supportive and 
positive school environments./"

The report also highlights how school budgets across the state have been 
increasingly devoted to school police and security at the expense of 
vital support and educational services. For example, Oakland Unified 
School District has over 115 law enforcement officers and security 
personnel, but only 11 counselors, four psychologists, and zero social 
workers in the entire district.


      In 2011-12 there were at least 18 other districts across the state
      that spent more on school security than they did on counselors,
      psychologists, and social workers.

For example, in Los Angeles Unified School District, the budget for 
school police and security is $91.3 million, which is more than what the 
district budgeted for afterschool programs, 73% more than it budgeted 
for counselors, and far more than double what it budgeted for health 
services and teacher assistants. In fact, the police/security budget was 
substantially more than the combined budgets for the arts program, 
psychologists, the Office of Civil Rights, instructional aides, 
psychiatric social workers, parent involvement, and career technical 
education.

"/These misplaced priorities have deepened the longstanding resource 
inequities faced by communities of color,/" said Jackie Byers, Director 
of the Black Organizing Project. "/Resources that could have gone 
towards support staff, afterschool programs, and more effective 
disciplinary alternatives instead have gone towards school police, 
security guards, and surveillance cameras in many of our school 
districts, which serve mostly Black and Latino youth. In other words, an 
increasing percentage of the funds allocated to California's low-income 
youth of color have been used in ways that have actively harmed them/."

The report presents a series of recommendations for using the state's 
new Local Control Funding Formula to shift investments from school 
policing to proven alternatives that promote healthy school climates, 
improved academic achievement, and greater school safety.

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
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