Education improves at Ohio juvenile detention facilities

DAYTON (AP) — Libraries, regular student assemblies and more computers with better software are all part of a newly upgraded school system operating within the state’s juvenile detention facilities.

The improvements were mandated in a legal settlement last April, and the Ohio Department of Youth Services has since raised its education spending by 36 percent and hired 34 more teachers, reducing the student-teacher ratio from 10-to-1 to 7-to-1.

“The kids say, ‘This looks like a real high school,’” veteran youth prisons teacher Cynthia McLarty said. “Well, yeah, this is a real high school, and I’m a real teacher.”

In January 2008, a fact-finder in a federal class action lawsuit gave failing marks to Ohio’s youth prisons school system, where 1,048 students attend school behind bars at seven facilities around the state.

The consultant, Fred Cohen, cited teacher shortages and absenteeism, inconsistent discipline and cramped classrooms. Students held in isolation or receiving mental health treatment often missed mandated classroom time, he wrote.

Cohen also found the state’s youth prisons were overcrowded and understaffed, and excessive use of force was common and ingrained in the agency’s operations.

The department’s settlement last April ended legal challenges that dated to 2004. The agreement called for as much as $30 million in additional annual spending and the hiring of more than 100 extra guards, as well as additional psychologists, nurses and social workers.

Improvements to the department’s school system were a cornerstone of the settlement. And there are hopeful signs that the right changes are being made, said Kim Tandy, executive director of The Children’s Law Center, one of the groups that had sued the department.

Several teachers told the Dayton Daily News — which was recently given wide access to the department’s school system — that it is less dangerous inside youth prisons schools than in public schools. Students on the outside are more likely to be high or carrying weapons, the teachers say.

Inside the department’s schools, security takes a front seat along with math and reading. Teachers inventory pencils before and after every class in case a student swipes one for use as a weapon. Instructors wear panic buttons on their belts. And staples, scissors and glue aren’t allowed inside classrooms.

“You got to watch them at all times,” teacher Greg Van Curen said of the students. “You can’t turn your back.”

One teacher said she’s been flashed by a student, and another suffered a broken nose in a near riot many years ago. But those were just isolated incidents, the teachers said.

“I feel safer here than I ever felt in public schools,” said McLarty, who taught for seven years in Detroit Public Schools before joining the department 25 years ago.

Even with more funding, teachers still need to find a way to motivate students, most of whom are years behind academically. That will be a tough challenge, but the locked doors of a youth prison facility make it difficult for students to give up, McLarty said.

“We have a captive audience,” she said. “They can’t go anywhere.”