Using police officers to enforce discipline in our nation's schools is a terrible idea. Police officers are trained to deal with conflict using skills that may not translate very well when interacting with adolescents who may be lacking in social and emotional competency. Further, there is no empirical data to indicate that this approach will lead to safer and more successful schools in the long run.
I am fearful that this recommendation to place police officers in our schools is yet another hyperbolic response to recent incidents that have more to do with the complex emotional and behavioural needs of adolescents than it has to do with the perceived breakdown of law and order in our society.
Let's take things in perspective. No one can seriously argue that these recent incidents are not troubling. But the children (yes, these are children) involved are equally troubled and perhaps struggling with poor social and self-management skills, not so atypical of young adults.Hence, I am wary of our nation's over-reliance on aggressive law and order approaches that may have the unintended effect of planting hostility and distrust in our school children and their parents who entrust their welfare to school officials.
Further, the impact of law enforcement in the schools is likely to be disproportionately felt where students occupy the lower socio-economic strata of society. They are the children of the voiceless and marginalised. They represent a problem that we too hastily and anxiously throw paternalistic policies at without seeking their consultation. They deserve our love, support and inclusion not a cleared pathway to the criminal justice system.
Perhaps there are important lessons to be learned from the US, where police presence in urban school districts has not worked particularly well. In one article published in The New York Times earlier this year, it was reported that data collected by the US Education Department shows that the use of law enforcement as a means to discipline students has disproportionately increased the number of arrests and expulsions of minority students for minor infractions.
This is a trend that has alarmed civil rights groups and has in large part fuelled the "school-to-prison pipeline." This disturbing trend led the US attorney general to issue guidelines, in the form of a 35-page document, that recommend that school administrators use law enforcement only as a last resort when disciplining students.
The US Department of Education guidelines outline approaches that focus on counseling for students, training and coaching for school personnel and safety officers, and teaching the development of social and emotional skills that will assist students in redirecting their energy, avoid conflict and re-focus on learning.
Khadine De Paiva,
via e-mail