youth justice coalition - history of the school to jail track and how to dismantle it

CONSTRUCTION OF THE SCHOOL-TO-JAIL TRACK

YOUTH SEEN AS

SATAN1600s

ORIGINAL SINThe Puritans believe that children are born close to the Devil, and the role of society and family is to wrestle Satan from within the child.

FIRST PUBLIC SCHOOLS

Massachusetts’ Old Satan Deluder Act of 1647 establishes first public school system. Since, Puritans believed that children were born with the “original sin,” they had to be raised in an atmosphere of fear, strict discipline, hard work, and a strong knowledge of the Bible to delude Satan.

YOUTH SEEN AS

SAVAGES1800/1900s

INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTIONAs the Nation’s first well-known State Secretary of Education, Horace Mann argued in 1837 that public education’s goals are to create an “industrious class of women and men” who obey the law and are diligent in their work.” For factory and mining work, only basic literacy was required. By 1860, there were no more than 300 high schools in the United States, less than 100 of them free. The public education system designed by Franklin and promoted by Mann is still the standard public school curriculum today.

ClassroomManagement

With strict discipline, “one who studies educational theory can see in the mechanical routine of the classroom, the educative forces that are slowly transforming the child from a little savage into a creature fit for law and order, fit for the life of civilized society.” - 1907

William Chandler Bagley

YOUTH SEEN AS

REBELS, RADICALS &

REVOLUTIONARIES1960s - EARLY

70s

OUT OF L.A. CAME THE BUILDERS OF SCHOOL DE-FUNDING AND MASS INCARCERATION

’65 Watts Rebellion in response to police brutality in South L.A. FBI and police surveillance, infiltration and bombing of Panther headquarters in L.A. and Pasadena; leads to United Slaves shoot out with Panthers at UCLA. (US leader Karenga goes on to found Kwanzaa and teach at Cal State Long Beach.) Geronimo Pratt (now Geronimo Ji Jaga) is framed by LAPD and FBI. Crushing of prisoners’ rights movement at Soledad; guards assassinate George Jackson and his brother. (Jacksons are from Pasadena.) Angela Davis teaches and organizes at UCLA. LAPD riot on Chicano Moratorium and assassination of L.A. Times reporter Ruben Salazar. CIA floods L.A.’s neighborhoods with drugs.

IN L.A. :

U.S. POLICIES THAT COME OUT OF L.A.:Nixon’s Law and Order backlash after 60s movements leads to mass incarceration of poor people and people of color. The prison population increases 300% in 20 years. Cali and L.A. lead the world in incarceration and harsh sentencing, including creation of JLWOP, Three Strikes, Prop 21 and Prop 9 - all are written and financed from L.A.. Reaganomics including anti-tax movement and Prop 13., the “war on drugs” and war on welfare, and mental health de-institutionalization without community services, all lead to massive increase in homelessness. L.A. creates “planned Skid Row” to force homeless into downtown isolation. U.S. fuels wars against rebellions in Central America. In the 1980s, LAPD and Sheriffs work with U.S. military to teach counter-guerilla tactics, interrogation and torture against civilians. In the 90s and 00s, they return to teach gang suppression when people are deported - (the greatest number from L.A.)

Chief Parker introduces military-style policing and brings National Guard into Watts in ‘65. Gates takes militarization further by creating SWAT and CRASH (first gang units).’92 Uprising once again reflects L.A.’s anger over entrenched police brutality. Gates also created DARE.2007 - Jordan Downs is first community in the U.S. to get GPS surveillance system. L.A. and Riverside first to use GPS monitoring to track people with gang convictions returning home from prison.

THEN CAME L.A.’S “WAR ON GANGS”

YOUTH SEEN AS

SUPERPREDATORS

1980s - 1990s

PRESIDENT REAGAN APPOINTS WILLIAM

BENNET AS U.S. SECRETARY OF

EDUCATION.

Zero Tolerance

policies include requirements for suspension, expulsion and

arrests; the takeover of school discipline by police

departments; and relationships in schools replaced by metal

detectors, locker searches, drug-sniffing dogs, and security

gates.

1. Police Departments take over school security

2. More Probation Officers than Counselors

3. Schools look and run like prisons; some have the same architects

4. Searches, metal detectors, gang profiling

5. Leads to massive push-out and arrest

Los Angeles County built the nation’s first comprehensive gang suppression policies:

[1] Gang injunctions - first in 1983, the ability to lock down a neighborhood and arrest people if they are on the street with another alleged gang member, out past a curfew, or carrying a cell phone.

[2] Gang databases in 1987 - computerized lists that label people as “gang members” without their knowledge, without any chance to appeal, and without a clear way to get off. (3) The statewide STEP Act in 1988 that provided the nation’s first law targeting street gangs, first gang definition, first language referring to gang members as “terrorists,” first gang enhancements in court, and took database statewide [Cal Gangs Database].

[4] In 1985, L.A. established CLEAR I[Community Law Enforcement and Recovery].

THESE POLICIES HAVE FUELED CALIFORNIA’S ADDICTION TO INCARCERATION

BECAUSE OF THE CHANGES IN LAWS AND POLICING, IN THE EARLY 1980s, CALIFORNIA ALSO STARTED TO

RAPIDLY EXPAND THE BUILDING OF PRISONS AND CUT THE BUDGET TO EVERYTHING ELSE.

DURING THAT SAME TIME, CALIFORNIA BUILT ONE UNIVERSITY AND TWO CAL STATES.

California used to be #1 in school spending and had one of the best school

systems in the world.

Now, California is #1 in prison spending, and with this year’s budget cuts,

dropped from #47 to #50 in school spending!

South and East L.A. lead the nation in school overcrowding,

low test scores and drop-out/push-out rates

with only 40% of students graduating.

SOLUTIONS

FULL IMPLEMENTATION OF TWO BILLS THE YJC SPONSORED OR CO-SPOSORED LAST YEAR: SB 458 REQUIRES THAT ALL POLICE - INCLUDING SCHOOL POLICE - NOTIFY PEOPLE WHEN THEY ARE PUT ON THE GANG DATABASE AND ALSO GUARANTEES RIGHTS TO APPEAL AND REMOVAL;

SB 549 ENCOURAGES SCHOOLS TO PRIORITIZE NEW FUNDS FOR COUNSELORS AND INTERVENTION/PEACE WORKERS

OVER POLICE.

THESE BILLS BECOME CALIFORNIA LAW JANUARY 1, 2013. IF OUR SCHOOLS DON’T FULLY IMPLEMENT THEM, WE CAN NOTIFY THEM THAT THEY’RE BREAKING THE LAW.

Intervention Savings: Each Murder Costs $1 Million to investigate and approximately $17 million more in Jail, Court and Incarceration. With drastic decreases in homicide, should the saved money be reinvestment in our schools and communities?

Just

1%

of L.A.’s Courts, Police, Sheriffs’ District Attorney’s, Probation’s and City Attorney’s Budgets would pay for: 500 full-time gang intervention workers; 50 youth centers open from 3pm - midnight, 365 days a year; and 25,000 youth jobs!

FOR THE YJC: TRANSFORMATIVE JUSTICE (TJ) HAS SOME OF THE SAME

GOALS AS RJ, BUT ADDS COMMUNITY AND SYSTEM ACCOUNTABILITY:

Criminal and Juvenile Court:

1. What law was broken?2. Who broke it?3. What punishment is warranted?4. Competition between lawyers - assumes two opposing sides.5. Assumes guilty and innocent parties - victim and perpetrator.6. Not responsible for determining or addressing root causes of conflict.

Transformative Justice:1. Who was harmed?2. What are the needs and

responsibilities of those involved?

3. How do all affected parties together address needs and repair harm?

4. Is non-adversarial. Seeks an outcome all parties can agree to.

4. What are the root causes of the conflict?

5. What community and/orsocietal change is needed to change relationships, conditions and power?

Job and Cost Comparisons Between Law Enforcement and Intervention