Police target black kids in schools

By David A. LOVE

Tribune News Service

The viral video of a cop’s assault on a 16-year-old African- American girl in a South Carolina classroom exemplifies a disturbing trend. All across America, black children are becoming police brutality victims in school.

The video shows a hulking Richland County Deputy Sheriff en Fields wrapping his arms around Shakara’s neck as she sits at her desk in a Columbia, S.C., classroom. He then flips and drags her across the floor. Shakara’s offense was failing to get up after her teacher ordered her to leave because she had not put away her cellphone quickly enough.

This is not the only recent incident of unnecessary force used at a school.

In September of last year, Brittany Overstreet, 17, was beaten by a school police officer at Chamberlain High School in Tampa, Fla., over an allegation that she was carrying mace. She said she was slammed against tables, lost consciousness, suffered a concussion and a broken jaw and ended up in the hospital. The girl was handcuffed, and prosecutors charged her with resisting arrest, battery and disrupting a school function.

In January, a middle-school student in Baltimore required 10 stitches after being assaulted by a school cop.

Zero tolerance policies and putting police in public schools have turned age-specific behavior by children – such as dress code violations and talking back to teachers – into criminal acts. What once merited a trip to the principal’s office now means jail for disobedient kids.

America needs to deal with an epidemic of punishment of black children. According to the civil rights organization Advancement Project, 16 percent of students, nationwide, are black, yet black kids account for 27 percent of students referred to law enforcement.

A University of Pennsylvania study discovered that of 1.32 million expulsions and suspensions of African-American children, 55 percent took place in the South. And in 132 school districts in the former Confederacy, black students were suspended at a rate five times greater than their representation in the population. This is particularly disturbing because of what we know about the school-to-prison pipeline. The American Psychological Association has found that police officers, mostly white males, do not view black children as innocent and in need of protection. Black children are more likely perceived as older than they actually are and as guilty of a crime.

Public schools are becoming more like prisons, resembling penitentiaries and staffed with law enforcement officers. Schools should instead provide nurturing environments that inspire and protect children and expand their possibilities.

We need to allow black children to be children.

Love is a freelance writer based in Philadelphia. He wrote this for Progressive Media Project.