Fair and Just School Climate

The Obama administration has reversed course on the high-stakes, high-frequency federal testing policies of the last decade. Following the policies of the Bush administration's No Child Left Behind, programs like Race to the Top encouraged tests that were used for crucial decisions like school funding, teacher hiring, and school takeovers. They also increased the amount of time students spend testing, reducing their instructional time and contributing to curriculum that reduced breadth and depth of learning for more test preparation. Now, while not wholly abandoning standardized testing, the administration finally responded to mounting criticism against these tests and is calling for capping the amount of time students can spend on them.

Last week was Dignity in School’s national week of action to end school pushout. All week parents, students, educators, and activists held events across the country to engage their communities and spread information about ways we can rethink discipline in public schools. The national week of action had four major demands: to shift funding to restorative discipline practices, to use positive behavioral interventions instead of suspensions and expulsions, to fully implement restorative justice practices, and to engage parents and students about discipline policies.

Under a beautiful October sky on the edge of the French Quarter, 700 people from around the country converged on New Orleans. Students, parents, teachers, community activists, labor organizers, policy experts, and advocates of a multitude of issues came together for a weekend of education, collaboration, and engagement.

Organized by the Schott Foundation and the American Federation of Teachers, with more than a dozen co-sponsoring local and national organizations, our key theme was community and labor organizing together for racial justice.

In a recent op-ed, Kavitha Mediratta, lauds the progress made by New York City schools in challenging the school the prison pipeline through their efforts in school discipline reform. Although much, of course, remains to be done, she argues that recent moves by NYC Mayer, Bill de Blasio, herald a step in the right direction. 

Grassroots organizers in New York City have been fighting for school discipline reform for years, and their hard work paid off this week when the City Council passed next year's budget with $2.4 million in funding for restorative justice programs.

The New York City Council is considering a bill that would use public school funding to provide NY Police Department safety agents to private schools. In response, Kesi Foster, Coordinator for the Urban Youth Collaborative, wrote an op-ed arguing this bill not only hurts public schools financially, but also directly contributes to the school-to-prison pipeline.

Youth organizer Jaritza Geigel gave a powerful speech in New York last week about her own personal experiences with harsh school discipline, its devastating and disproportionate impact on students of color, and the work done thus far to combat it.

Several years after the grassroots organization Padres y Jóvenes Unidos won district-wide school discipline reform in Denver, they've released their 4th annual "Denver Community Accountability Report Card," tracking schools' progress in implementing those hard-won reforms.

The African American Policy Forum, Advancement Project, Dream Defenders, and others released a new video that powerfully reaffirms the multitude of reasons why #BlackGirlsMatter. In the wake of high-profile police violence against black men and boys, and thanks to initiatives like President Obama's My Brother's Keeper initiative, national attention has begun to focus on the myriad problems black boys face. However, these efforts often ignore black girls, who face not only the same systemic racism, but also sexism.