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MINORITIES, STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES BEAR BRUNT OF SCHOOL VIOLENCE FEARS

May 9, 2000

Tougher stances on juvenile crime in school have a disproportionate impact on minorities and students with disabilities, according to a recent study by Washington, D.C.'s Justice Policy Institute and the Children's Law Center, a non-profit legal services firm in Kentucky. Even as statistics show a drop in violent crime in recent years, growing fear among parents and educators is generating public support for more frequent suspensions and expulsions. With minorities and students with disabilities already over-represented in the population of suspended and expelled youth, the policy groups argue, those students will be the first to feel the impact of stricter disciplinary plans with shorter review and referral cycles.

Violence is Dropping

Despite the highly publicized tragedies at schools in Littleton, Colo., Paducah, Ky., and several other areas in recent years, the overall incidence of violent crime on school property is dropping, the policy groups say in their report, School House Hype: Two Years Later. School-associated violent deaths dropped 40 percent, from 43 to 26, between the 1997-98 school year and the 1998-99 school year. Nevertheless, the number of U.S. adults who say they worry about the safety of their local schools increased nearly 50 percent in that period.

Students' self-reported crimes have also dropped steadily from 1993 through 1997, according to a separate study by the Centers for Disease Control. Overall fights among youth are down 14 percent from the previous year, and fights on school grounds are down 9 percent. Students also report carrying weapons less frequently, with the number who took one to school in the 30 days prior to CDC's survey down 25 percent from the year before.

Unlike their parents and other adults in their communities, relatively few students told the CDC they feel going to school is dangerous. "Although recent events have focused national attention on school violence, violence among adolescents is a more generalized problem. School violence may be viewed as a reflection or extension of youth violence in the larger community," the CDC said in its report.

Expulsion Further Alienates Students

Despite the students' observations, the adults making policy decisions for their school districts are transforming the nation's schools into "funnels for the juvenile justice system," the Justice Policy Institute argues. "Nearly every state has recently changed their laws to require that schools share information with the courts -- watering down the confidentiality laws that were the hallmark of the juvenile court's rehabilitative model. Teachers and principals are referring students to police, settling trivial matters in the courts rather than in the classrooms," the study says. As they do this, the policy group says, school officials must pay closer attention to the impact stricter suspension and expulsion policies have on populations that are already at-risk, such as minorities and students with disabilities.

Past research shows that the risk of dropping out or getting in trouble with the law becomes greater once a student is suspended or expelled. For youth with low socio-economic status or kids with disabilities, that risk is even greater because they often lack the resources or skills they need to manage in the outside world. Though some studies show that 95 percent of students with disabilities who are suspended or expelled are not disciplined for violent behavior, those children are disproportionately more likely to drop out of school once they are suspended or expelled, some researchers say. Amendments passed in 1997 to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act are geared to change that, guaranteeing that students with disabilities who are suspended for more than 10 days will continue to receive educational and related services outside of school.

IDEA DISCIPLINE RULES ENSURE CONTINUED SCHOOLING FOR VIOLENT STUDENTS July 9, 1999

The School House Hype report cited case studies from Maryland and Massachusetts showing unusually high suspension rates for students with disabilities. In Maryland, students receiving special education services make up about 13 percent of the school population, yet they comprise 23.1 percent of those who were suspended in 1998-99 and 18.4 percent of those receiving "long-term" suspensions. The numbers are similar in Massachusetts. One quarter of all children expelled there in 1998-99 were in special ed programs, though students with special needs comprise only 15 percent of the general student population.

Looming Lawsuits

Besides improving student safety, the report suggests many school districts are adopting stricter anti-violence policies to avoid lawsuits. Again driven by the publicity surrounding the Littleton, Colo., and Paducah, Ky., incidents, school administrators and boards are becoming more aware of their liability. In Littleton, attorneys are seeking $2.5 million in a wrongful death suit against the parents of Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, the two students who killed 12 classmates and one teacher before killing themselves. In Kentucky, more than 30 school officials and the parents of Michael Carneal, who killed three and wounded five others in 1997, are the targets of a similar suit.

Ironically, though, the stricter policies schools are drafting to avoid such lawsuits may draw legal challenges of their own, the Justice Policy report says. Students and parents in some areas have challenged school officials for disciplinary policies that violate their due process rights. "In instances involving students experiencing educational disabilities, failure on the part of a school district to adhere to federal disability laws may prove costly for a district too eager to impose discipline without proper consideration of the child's disabilities," the report notes. "Increasing rates of suspension and expulsion may well make these challenges more frequent, as students turn to courts to protect their due process rights and continued access to educational services."

The policy groups offer three general approaches to improving both the perceived and the actual safety of schools without infringing on students' rights. Just as federal education officials and teachers unions have done in recent months, the report calls on the media to take a less sensationalistic approach to reporting incidents of school violence. The report suggests reporters "infuse contextual data about school safety into their reporting" to help readers keep the overall violence picture in perspective. Second, the report endorses stricter gun laws that specifically focus on ways to prevent students from brining guns to school and address children's access to guns.

Finally, the report supports school districts' use of research-based methods for creating safe learning environments, such as the U.S. Department of Education's 1998 "Early Warning, Timely Response" manual and the supplement released last month, "Safeguarding Our Children: An Action Guide."

"Recent research has found that schools in which students clearly understand the rules against violence experience fewer violent incidents than schools which rely on metal detectors and locker searches for security," the policy groups note.8