On January 8, the US Departments of Education and Justice issued new guidelines aimed at reversing punitive discipline policies like "zero tolerance."
Instead of pushing young people out with suspensions and expulsions (disproportionately targeting black and Latino students), they said, we must "take deliberate steps to create the positive school climates that can help prevent and change inappropriate behaviors. Such steps include training staff, engaging families and community partners, and deploying resources to help students develop the social, emotional, and conflict resolution skills needed to avoid and deescalate problems." They also cite restorative approaches as a constructive approach.
Read the the new plan's key document: Guiding Principles: A Resource Guide for Improving School Climate and Discipline.
Meanwhile, youth and adult activists around the country are taking action on their own:
- Alexandria students push for alternatives to suspension "I think school can be a place where you learn from your mistakes," Ana Diaz, 16, says in the Washington Post. "We should be taught how to be a better person and how to do things better. [It should not be] a place where you did something wrong and so you got kicked out."
- In Chicago, community activists are calling for restorative approaches instead of punishment as a way to address behavior issues and create a positive school climate: "We believe that restorative practices in the schools will improve the social and emotional https://www.acheterviagrafr24.com/viagra-pfizer/ health of students and increase academic performance," said Nancy Michaels.Grassroots Group at Roosevelt University Announces Plan for Positive School Climate
- Others are trying to close the school-to-prison pipeline from the other side, by raising the age at which young people can be charged as adults. "On any given day in the United States, about 70,000 children are held in residential juvenile centers ...and at least two thirds of them are https://www.acheterviagrafr24.com/achat-viagra-cialis-levitra/ charged with nonviolent offenses," Activists Push for Juvenile Justice System Reforms, in AlJazeera America.