School Suspension Policy Analysis

As of 2007, the school security system increased by 37% in the United States. This was caused by the ideology of “zero tolerance” school discipline, which comes from the “get tough on drugs and crime” policies back in the 1980’s. In the same time period, Ronald Reagan’s Administration Declaration springed a crime and law enforcement world to take a “tough on crime stance”. This lead to the populations of most prisons being tripled over the last 3 decades.

The SPP:

“We know that overuse of suspension, expulsion, and other harsh disciplinary policies increase the likelihood that youth will enter the juvenile or criminal justice systems.” The term “Super Predator” was very misguided in the 1990’s and automatically branded to young people of color as criminal, not only stating the negative story but increasing the punishments for them. This is how the school to prison pipeline (SPP) got started.

Schools Using The SPP policy: Suspension is connected with lower ratings for overall school climate, lower academic performance among students, lower school-wide academic performance, and an increased school

dropout. “Years of social experiment research, quantitative information, and the lived experiences of immensely bad families and communities tells us these policies are putting youth, especially youth of color on a pathway to prison.” Schools and school districts are using these methods in their own school discipline codes.

Although the juvenile crime rate is strongly decreasing, the discipline is immensely increasing.

The out of school suspension rate has went up about 10% since 2000. They have more than doubled since the 1970’s. And it’s hardly balanced when comes to race: Black students are nearly 3 times to be suspended or expelled than the caucasian students Schools have also increasingly brought law enforcement into the classroom. Police in schools has dramatically increased in the last 20 years. According to the United States Department of Justice, the number of school resource officers increased 38% between 1997 and 2007. The regular occurrence of school security guards increased 27% between the years 1999 and 2007. This action is the result of the reaction to problems of highly publicized jail crimes and the idea that an increased quantity of schools were getting more

violent.
The Disturbance of this Policy/Program: The laws of the famous term “Three-strikes” state that the person is imprisoned at their third offense, no matter the severity. When students are forced out of schools though harsh and very extreme disciplinary policies, their education is strongly disturbed.
Conclusion:
Questioned from the National Public Radio (NPR), “Is Having more police in schools very important and harmful consequences for young people? Could this be increasing arrest rates, isolating students and making them feel less safe?
Some school districts and even the Government are arguing that the school-to-prison pipeline is not only to “treat children humanely and keep them out of prison, it also promises to be a first step towards offering every child the opportunity”.