Race Hustlers, Cops, and No Excuses

[Order David Horowitz’s new book, America Betrayed, HERE.]

The U.S. Government Accountability Office has just issued a report that claims students of color and those with disabilities are more likely to be arrested in school-based incidents.

The GAO asserts that an analysis of “the Department of Education’s data collected from nearly every U.S. school district found that students’ race and ethnicity, gender, and disability status were all prominent with respect to rates of arrest and referrals to police, especially when the characteristics intersected. Specifically, in school year 2017–2018, the most recent year of data prior to the pandemic, Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, Black, and American Indian/Alaska Native students were arrested at rates that were two to three times higher than White students. For boys who had a disability, the differences in arrest rates widened further.”

The document also states, “Arrest rates more than doubled in schools with police present compared to similar schools without police. Among the 51% of schools with police present at least once a week, GAO found that arrests were more common when the police were involved in student discipline.” With respect to gender, “boys were arrested and referred to police around double the rate of girls.”

On a similar note, statistics released in 2023 from the Civil Rights Data Collection show that in the 2020-21 school year, Black boys made up 8% of K-12 students enrolled nationally, but were 15% of students who received in-school suspensions, 18% of students who received of out-of-school suspensions, and 18% of students who were expelled.

But the information not included in these dispatches is very troubling.

The cold statistics lead us to believe that Black and disabled students are being disproportionately picked on due to racism and “ableism.” But is it possible that Black boys, who make up 8% of students, did in fact, commit 18% of suspension-worthy offenses? Is it possible that the reason for minority students being arrested more frequently than white students is they are committing more crimes?

Neither report touches on those basic questions.

Perhaps the real problem is that bad behavior in school—and many other societal malaises—isn’t caused by bigots, but rather by broken homes. As Thomas Patterson, a retired emergency physician and former leader of the Arizona State Senate, notes, “In 1960, 24 percent of black children were born to single mothers. By 2018 the figure was 70 percent. Overall, 37 percent of black kids live with married parents, compared with 84 percent of Asians and 77 percent of whites. Families headed by single mothers are five times as likely to live in poverty than those of married couple-headed families. We all know the depressing statistics for fatherless children – the increased incidence of incarceration and drug dependence, the lower probability of educational achievement, and the high likelihood they will create single parent-headed families themselves.”

The GAO’s assertion that “arrests were more common when the police were involved in student discipline” is meaningless. Maybe the students should have been arrested. Also, importantly, the report intimates that cops are racist, but it does not mention the race of the cops making the arrests. So maybe Black cops are arresting Black kids proportionately. This doesn’t seem to be of interest to the GAO racial bean counters, however.

It’s worth noting that teachers don’t want cops removed from schools. A Heritage Foundation survey found that only 7% of teachers responded affirmatively to the question, “Do you think defunding school resource officers will make schools safer?”

Additionally, an EdWeek Research Center poll from 2020 found that only 20% of teachers, principals, and district leaders completely or partly agreed that armed police officers should be eliminated from public schools.

Parents aren’t fond of the idea, either. In Los Angeles, a district-commissioned survey found that 72% of Asian-American and Pacific Islander parents, 67% of Hispanic parents, 54% of white parents, and 50% of black parents agreed that a police presence makes schools safer.

No matter. The educational establishment, heavily influenced by the teachers’ unions, prefers the touchy-feely method of dealing with kids who act out, regardless of its efficacy.

In Los Angeles, the school district cut 133 or about 40% of its school cops in favor of kinder and gentler “climate coaches” in 2021. It was also decided that police would no longer patrol campuses and would only be called upon to respond in person during emergencies.

In February of this year, the Chicago school district followed suit, adopting a resolution that creates “a comprehensive whole school safety policy in Chicago Public Schools.” Hence, dozens of Chicago high schools that had employed school resource officers to protect students and staff from violence will no longer be allowed to do so.

The resolution directs Chicago Public School leaders to develop “a holistic approach to school safety at every District school” that “addresses root causes” of violence, and that focuses on “restorative justice” and “healing-centered practices.”

In fact, restorative justice has become commonplace. A survey by Parents Defending Education finds that 1,439 districts, 32,122 schools, and 18,613,391 students are at the mercy of this policy.

As a result of restorative justice practices, discipline suffers, and a few disruptors can make life miserable for behaving students and teachers alike. It turns teachers and counselors into therapists, emphasizes “making the victim and offender whole,” and involves “an open discussion of feelings.” Of all the well-meaning but harmful fads that have appeared in our public schools in recent years, non-evidenced-based restorative justice and other similar non-consequences for willful defiance and more serious acts might be the most destructive.

More school districts should adopt the “No Excuses” model. RealClearInvestigations reports on a charter school in Ohio that uses this approach. “On a bright morning in May at the Columbus Collegiate Academy Main, orderliness is on display. Students in khakis and blue tops carrying bulging backpacks walk briskly in line through the front doors of the single-story brick building – looking like young people who really want to be there. The predominantly black and Latino student body is seriously engaged, with pencils in hand or fingers on keyboards, and no one is fooling around or disturbing others.”

The Ohio school is one of about a thousand high-performing urban charters that run on the No Excuses model. “These schools require students to sit up at their desks, remain silent unless called upon, and respect each other, which creates calm conditions for learning. Culture-building begins immediately at the start of each year. In the first three days of school, called ‘culture camp,’ students learn the rules of behavior, such as keeping their eyes on the teacher and a pencil at the ready, and why those rules are key to meeting the high academic standards. Then they practice these skills, like how to show respect to teachers and peers, before they open a textbook.”

The Los Angeles Unified School District should try the No Excuses approach instead of using the useless climate coaches they hired in 2021. The district reported 4,569 incidents of physical aggression in the 2022-23 school year, nearly double the number from 2018.

I’m not optimistic that any real change will happen in our traditional public schools, however.

Larry Sand, a retired 28-year classroom teacher, is the president of the non-profit California Teachers Empowerment Network – a non-partisan, non-political group dedicated to providing teachers and the general public with reliable and balanced information about professional affiliations and positions on educational issues. The views presented here are strictly his own.