Jason Langberg, Op-Ed, News Observer, 01/23/12

RALEIGH -- It's a new year and an opportunity for a fresh start in the Wake County Public School System. Now is the time to join together with a renewed focus on student achievement - and to improve student achievement we must address school discipline, as the two are inextricably linked.

Last year, positive changes alleviated the school system's discipline crisis, including additional seats at Mary Phillips High School, revisions to the Code of Conduct and the creation of Alternative Learning Centers. However, thousands upon thousands of students - disproportionately male students, black students and students with disabilities - are still being pushed out of schools and onto a path toward poverty and prison.

Academic failure; inadequate prevention, intervention and alternative programs; suspensions; school-based arrests and court referrals, along with other policies and practices, contribute to the problem.

The following resolution, if adopted and accomplished, would go a long way toward much-needed, comprehensive, sustained discipline reform, ensuring that schools are places where children are nurtured, supported, inspired, treated fairly and equitably and given every opportunity to succeed.

During 2012, in furtherance of its mission to "significantly increase achievement for all students...," the system resolves to:

• Support students by: implementing Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports (PBIS) in all schools; following high-quality Personal Education Plans for students at risk of academic failure and Individualized Education Programs for students with disabilities; and making significant investments in Counseling and Student Services.
• Support parents/guardians by: initiating parent/guardian leadership institutes and informational workshops; building relationships through an Office of Family and Community Engagement, parent information and resource centers, parent liaisons and more accessible meetings and events; and providing teachers and administrators with professional development and time for family engagement.
• Support teachers' efforts to keep students engaged and academically successful by providing them with adequate instructional resources, support staff (e.g., teaching assistants, psychologists, and social workers) and behavior management and interventions training.
• Support administrators' efforts to maintain safe and orderly learning environments by improving the availability of high-quality: prevention programs (such as PBIS); behavioral interventions (mentoring and mental health services); and alternatives to suspension (such as restorative justice).
• Make the Code of Conduct fairer by: including a section on students' rights; prohibiting out-of-school suspension for minor offenses; limiting the length of long-term suspensions; requiring administrators to use alternatives to suspension when available and appropriate, and to specify, in writing, which mitigating factors were considered; and providing stronger due process protections.
• Modify the memorandum of understanding among the school system and local law enforcement agencies to ensure that all school resource officers: play a clear, consistent role; are highly qualified and well-trained; have positive influences on and interactions with students and staff; and are properly limited and accountable.
• Ensure that suspended students are safe and productive, and make adequate academic progress, by improving the availability and use of high-quality structured day programs and non-computer-based alternative schools.
• Ensure the availability and use of an array of services by collaborating closely and strategically with community-based organizations.
• Improve transparency and oversight by creating a school discipline committee - made up of students, parents, teachers, administrators, and community members - to perform tasks such as reviewing data and revising policies and practices.
• Improve accountability by collecting and publishing standardized, disaggregated data (i.e., by the students' school, grade, gender, race, disability, free and reduced-price lunch status, and offense) on: placement in Alternative Learning Centers and alternative schools and programs; bus suspensions; in-school, short-term, long-term, and 365-day suspensions; and expulsions.

Ending the school push-out crisis once and for all isn't about Democrats or Republicans, claiming credit or placing blame. Instead, it's about our collective moral responsibility to our children - to safeguard their civil and human rights; to protect them from discouragement, stigmatization, trauma and the streets; and to provide them with the education they need to thrive in adulthood.

It's also about: treating mistakes and childishness as part of normal adolescent development and "teachable moments;" recognizing research and dispelling the myths that suspension is a deterrent to misbehavior and makes schools safer, and that the juvenile and criminal justice systems are rehabilitative; raising academic achievement and graduation rates, narrowing achievement gaps, and improving school climates; and saving money on policing, prosecution, incarceration, lost economic productivity, and dependence on public assistance.

Many Wake school system policies and practices have been models for districts across the country. School discipline reform here can similarly be a national model. Other school systems made comprehensive changes in 2011. In 2012, it's our turn.

Jason Langberg is an Equal Justice Works fellow/attorney at Advocates for Children's Services, a statewide project of Legal Aid of North Carolina.

Originally published here.