| Title: | School to Prison Pipeline |
|---|---|
| Course Section Number: | BLS-270-02 |
| Department: | Black Studies |
| Description: | "In the last decade, the punitive and overzealous tools and approaches of the modern criminal justice system have seeped into our schools, serving to remove children from mainstream educational environments and funnel them onto a one-way path toward prison.. The School-to-Prison Pipeline is one of the most urgent challenges in education today." (NAACP 2005) In this course, we will examine the ways in which the U.S. system of P-12 public education has become increasingly enmeshed with the criminal justice system. As the ACLU has noted, school disciplinary measures have become more rigid and more likely to divert students toward local law enforcement agencies. Beyond the area of school conduct issues, inequities that predict students' success in our testing-focused educational system may also predict students' likelihood of engagement with law enforcement (eg: family income and educational levels, presence/absence of learning exceptionalities, stereotyping based upon personal and/or cultural identity, and wealth/poverty levels of schools and neighborhoods). In this class, we will examine the underlying policies and school-level practices that contribute to this destructive pattern, along with interventions that have been developed, such as greater attention to students' educational and vocational needs, restorative justice approaches to behavioral issues, and a focus on social-emotional learning. Specific issues we will examine that are implicated in the so-called "school-to-prison pipeline" include: "Zero tolerance" disciplinary policies in schools that include conduct, attire, and speech in using law enforcement approaches and personnel; Patterns of inclusion/exclusion related to personal and cultural identity; High-stakes testing, including its role in restricting curricula and instructional practices ,as well as a focus on retention and remediation through rote approaches to remedial instruction; Restrictive approaches to curricula and classroom instruction-often driven by standardized testing --that disproportionately fail to engage students in higher-poverty schools; Lack of appropriate policies and practices for students with both diagnosed and undiagnosed disabilities and exceptionalities; and The ways in which underlying socioeconomic inequalities among communities and their schools tend to exacerbate factors that push students out of educational systems and toward the criminal justice system. BLS-270-02=EDU-230-02 |
| Credits: | 1.00 |
| Start Date: | August 23, 2023 |
| End Date: | December 16, 2023 |
| Meeting Information: |
08/24/2023-12/14/2023 Lecture Tuesday, Thursday 01:10PM - 02:25PM, Detchon, Room 109
|
| Faculty: | Seltzer-Kelly, Deborah |
Course Status & Cross-Listings
| Cross-list Group Capacity: | 18 |
|---|---|
| Cross-list Group Student Count: | 20 |
| Calculated Course Status: | CLOSED |
| Section Name/Title | Status | Dept. | Capacity |
Enrolled/ Available/ Waitlist |
|---|