Police free lausd statement on school safety incidents
The Police Free LAUSD Coalition aims to create holistically safer, welcoming, and affirming campuses for all students in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Our coalition works with students, families, educators, and advocates to create and support programming and services at LAUSD schools that improve school climate, safeguard community safety, and support academic achievement – all of which act as violence prevention in schools (for a full statement of the Coalition’s guiding values, see our report From Criminalization to Education: A Community Vision for Safe Schools in LAUSD). To these ends, the coalition has led the investment of $25 million in student achievement instead of policing and in the Black Student Achievement Plan. This community victory has made schools safer for Black, Indigenous, and other students of color, who no longer have to face cops on campus, but rather can be met with appropriate resources and care like PSW’s, counselors, school climate advocates, and BSAP staff.
LAUSD has committed to implementing evidence-based practice of community-based safety but has failed the students and parents by not doing what it takes to implement it. We are deeply disturbed by LAUSD’s response to incidents of conflict at schools, which has provoked panic and elevated a non-existent need for additional police presence in schools. The lack of true community-based safety is what creates unsafe environments for our students, but district leadership will not acknowledge the barriers they create to achieving physical and emotional safety in our schools. Research confirms that law enforcement does not prevent or cure all of our schools’ and communities’ problems. After a violent incident among students at Van Nuys High School, Superintendent Alberto Carvalho and board member Schmerlson have been quick to manipulate this incident as a justification for more police presence in schools, in spite of not successfully implementing alternative safety initiatives that were passed over 2 and a half years ago. This stance suggests that police are the antidote to violence in schools. A 2019 survey of Black and Brown youth conducted by the Brother Sons Selves Coalition, found that 67% of the students agreed that school police officers escalate situations. The results also showed that 73% of Black youth described school police officers as overly aggressive.
We urge the Superintendent and LAUSD Board of Education Members to hold their commitment to Black students and other students of color by working with the Police Free LAUSD coalition to:
Expand and improve the infrastructure of community-based safety initiatives, as put forward from the Community-based Safety Analysis and Expansion resolution passed in June 2023.
Invest in community-based safety programs, like safe passages, violence intervention and prevention practitioners, and community-led de-escalation training.
Invest and increase the funding for mental health services like therapists, psychiatric social workers (PSWs), restorative justice coordinators, counselors, wellness centers, and school nurses.
Eliminate the LA School Police Department.
Fueled by racist and criminalizing “zero-tolerance” approaches, LAUSD has over a 70-year history of Police presence on LAUSD campuses. In the 1950s, police started as a security force to monitor/control Black students during integration efforts. There is little evidence supporting the notion that police enhance safety for our students. To the contrary, police harm students, make them feel unsafe according to a survey conducted by Students Deserve and BLM-LA in 2020. Studies show that having even one school resource officer in schools on a weekly basis increases the likelihood of students becoming involved in the juvenile criminal system, especially Black, Brown, undocumented, and marginalized students. In fact, the following incidents are why we are fighting for a Police Free LAUSD:
LA School Police pepper-sprayed students at Dorsey, LA High, Fremont High School & other schools in 2019.
In 2021 LASPD shot a man likely experiencing a mental health episode outside Carver MS.
In 2021 a school safety officer in Long Beach Unified School District shot and killed, Mona Rodriguez, a 15-year-old student.
LA School Police shot a 17-year-old outside of Legacy High School
LAUSD framed a recent incident of violence between students at Van Nuys High School as gang-related. Too often, the mention of issues being “gang-related” is racially coded language, as if to shift blame onto Black and Brown communities.
Reducing violence starts with creating an environment where caring adults and students leaders are empowered to model healthy conflict-resolution and de-escalation practices. Police Officers whose ultimate duty is to protect property and represent colonial education cannot provide this. Contrastingly, there are community members who are trained in restorative practices and are equipped to support students and provide interventions. Social workers, restorative justice coaches, credible messengers, and involved family members are all positioned and best equipped to prevent community violence. Superintendent Carvalho and the LAUSD School Board of Education have failed to implement community-based safety programs like safe passage across BSAP Group 1 schools and ultimately across all schools. Incidents around safety in and around schools can be prevented through the implementation of these programs including a further investment of PSW’s, counselors, school climate advocates, and other trained staff to support the well-being of students.
We cannot prevent violence by introducing more weapons and more violence in schools, particularly when our Black, Indigenous, and other students of color will be forced to bear the brunt of it. Accordingly, we call on Superintendent Alberto Carvalho to endorse a complete elimination and replacement of the Los Angeles School Police Department with a comprehensive community-based safety initiative that includes both the implementation of programs around - as well as training for students, parents and school staff on - safe passages, peace-building, violence intervention and de-escalation, conflict resolution, restorative and transformative justice, and youth development programs.
Sincerely,
The Police-Free LAUSD Coalition, which includes Students Deserve, Black Lives Matter-LA, Labor Community Strategy Center, Brothers Sons Selves Coalition (BSS), InnerCity Struggle (ICS), Community Coalition, United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA), Social Justice Learning Institute (SJLI), Reclaim Our Schools LA, Communities for a Better Environment (CBE), ACLU of Southern California, Million Dollar Hoods and the Collective for Liberatory Lawyering.