From Juvenile Justice School To Prison Pipeline Essay

1. In the article, The School-to-Prison Pipeline: Rhetoric or Reality, by Aaron Kupchik, he discusses youth introduction to the juvenile justice system. The article argues that schools do in fact shape a child’s interaction with the system and it has to do with the school’s discipline, which Kupchik describes using “the school-to-prison pipeline” metaphor. The article delves into the unhealthy changes which schools have implemented to their discipline that promote the pipeline. He concludes by proposing strategies for reform that address the issue head on.

The school to prison pipeline continues to be one of the huge issues in an education system. In 1990s, zero-tolerance policies, which is “a strict enforcement of regulations and bans against undesirable behaviors or possession of items” (“zero”), have been adopted in various education system in the U.S. The purpose of these zero-tolerance policies was to prevent minor crimes that could become serious crimes, such as violation, murder, negligence, terrorism and more. Thus, many students get prosecuted and sent into the juvenile justice system because of this policy. Under this circumstance, schools should accept exception and consider the reason why they broke the rule. Also, students should not be given heavy punishments

“Tomorrow 's future is in the hands of the youth of today” is not a particularly new sentiment. But what is new, what has become a pressing question, is what is to become of the future if our youth are behind bars instead of in schools? Youth today are being pushed into the criminal justice system at an alarming rate. This issue is known as the school to prison pipeline ─ the rapid rate at which children are pushed out of schools and into the criminal justice system. The school to prison pipeline is a term that came into use by activists in the late 1970’s and has gained recognition throughout the years as the issue became more prominent in the 1990’s. Some activists view policies meant to “correct” misbehaviors, especially in regards to Zero Tolerance policies and the policing of schools, as a major contributor to the pipeline. Others believe that the funding of schools and the education standards are to blame for the rapid increase of youth incarcerations. While the school to prison pipeline affects every student, African American students, both male and female, are more often the victim of discrimination in education. The school to prison pipeline must end, and the trend must be reversed.

In the article, The School-to-Prison Pipeline: Rhetoric or Reality, by Aaron Kupchik, he discusses how youth are introduced to the juvenile justice system. The article argues that schools do in fact shape a child’s interaction with the system and it has to do with the school’s discipline, which Kupchik describes using a “the school-to-prison pipeline” metaphor. The article delves into the unhealthy changes that have been implemented to school’s discipline which promote the pipeline. He concludes by proposing strategies for reform that address the issue head on.

The school-to-prison pipeline in the United States is a figure of speech used to describe the increasing patterns of interaction students have with the juvenile and adult criminal justice systems as a consequence of procedures used by many school systems. A specific procedure would be the zero tolerance policies and the use of officers in schools. Currently in today’s American schools many children of color are being unfairly judged and treated by the public school systems zero tolerance policies. Zero tolerance policies have been implemented in schools in the last 20 years that include inserting school resource officers in schools and cracking down on all behavior that any authority figure may deem as a form of bad behavior. The policy is based upon deterring future misbehavior and is central to the philosophy of zero tolerance, and the effect of any punishment on future behavior is what defines effective punishment (Skinner, 1953). Zero tolerance policies causes the school environment to feel more like a prison and ultimately leads to black and Latinos being judged and guided to the prison system. A zero-tolerance policy orders predetermined penalties or punishments for specific wrongdoings.

• This article examines the effects of enforcement polices in schools dealing with troubled youth. • Racial disparities in regards to discipline of students in schools. • Examines schools in different states • Disuses the collaboration between schools and law enforcement • Finds that there are detrimental effects of the school to prison pipeline • Explains the correlation between stringent discipline, or zero tolerance policies and juvenile delinquency

This study is about the phenomena of students experiencing a transfer from school straight into juvenile and adult criminal justice systems. Heitzeg (2010, 1) presents how this study attempts to explain how the pipeline emerged with the help of media and youth violence. In addition to media, the process of moving youth toward the pipeline is also due to authority’s tendency to target youth according to racial, social, and economic backgrounds (Heitzeg, 2010). The implementations of zero tolerance policies exhibit a trend among African American and Hispanic/Latino youth. “African-American students are referred for misbehavior that is both less serious

Zero tolerance policies arose during the late 1980’s in response to a rising tide of juvenile arrests for violent offenses and the expanding view of youth as dangerous. During this time discipline in educational settings became much more formal and rigid. Discretion was removed from teachers and administrative staff in favor of broadly instituted policies, which often involved law enforcement and arrest. In 1994 Congress passed the Gun-Free Schools Act, which forced states to pass laws mandating expulsion for a minimum of one year for bringing a weapon to school in order to receive federal education funds. By the mid 90’s roughly 80% of schools had adopted zero tolerance policies beyond the federal requirements and in response the federal government began to increase funding for security guards and other school based law enforcement officers and equipment. These changes occurred primarily between 1996 and 2008 and mirrored changes in the juvenile justice system to more closely emulate the adult system.

The School-to-Prison Pipeline presents the intersection of a K-12 educational system and a juvenile system, which too often fails to serve our nations at risk youth. For most students, the pipeline begins with inadequate resources in public schools. Overcrowded classrooms, a lack of qualified teachers, and insufficient funding for "extras" such as counselors, special education services, even textbooks, lock students into second-rate educational environments. This failure to meet educational needs increases disengagement and dropouts, increasing the risk of later court involvement (Bennett-Haron, Fasching-Varner, Martin, & Mitchell 2014). Even worse, schools may actually encourage dropouts in response to pressures from test-based accountability regimes such as the No Child Left Behind Act, which create incentives to push out low-performing students to boost overall test scores (Cramer, Gonzales, & Lafont-Pellegrini 2014). Lacking resources, facing incentives to push out low-performing students, and responding to a handful of highly-publicized school shootings, schools have embraced zero-tolerance policies that automatically impose severe punishment regardless of circumstances. Under these policies, students have been expelled for bringing nail clippers or scissors to school (Christle, Jolivette, & Nelson 2005). Rates of suspension have increased dramatically in recent years from 1.7 million in 1998 to 3.1 million in 2010

The School-to-Prison Pipeline is a “national trend wherein children are funneled out of public schools and into the juvenile and criminal justice systems” (“School-to-Prison Pipeline”). This phenomenon brings children into the juvenile justice system at a very young age. An article published in the journal Urban Education explains that, “The school-to-prison pipeline contributes to the atmosphere of increased surveillance of schools including police presence in schools, zero-tolerance policies, physical restraint tactics, and automatic consequence policies, resulting in suspensions from school” (Martin, Beese 2015). By increasing police presence in schools, children are more likely to be searched, questioned, or targeted by police than they would be without police present. And as a result, “children are far more likely to be subject to school-based arrests—the majority of which are for nonviolent offenses, such as disruptive behavior—than they were a generation ago” (“School-to-Prison Pipeline”). For example, if a child was misbehaving in class in a school that had a police presence, they could possibly get arrested and sent to prison. But if a child was acting the same way in a school that did not have any police presence, they would not be arrested. Police would most likely be present in a school in an urban environment or poor neighborhood because more crime occurs in urban and poor places, so in theory, by placing police in schools, they would be preventing any crimes

The ever-growing problem that is occurring in public schools around the country is the school to prison pipeline epidemic. The school to prison pipeline is a term used to describe how students are being pushed out of public school and into the criminal justice system. This epidemic is a result of the education system’s zero tolerance policy that enforces harsh punishments for misbehaving students. Although its goal was to eliminate misbehavior, studies have shown that the increased disciplinary actions have resulted in a modified school environment, police in school

Upon reviewing the literature that some scholars have already research, I have found Fader, Lockwood, Schall, and Stokes and some other authors that have researched something similar to my question, “How is School to Prison Pipeline affecting juveniles around the United States?”. In 2014, Fader wrote an article called A Promising Approach to Narrowing the School-to-Prison Pipeline: The WISE Arrest Diversion Program. In the article, it mentions how the school to prison pipeline came about and how hard it is for a student who enters the school to prison pipeline to get out of it, there’s a stigma to the kids once they have entered the pipeline. By having an afterschool program called WISE might help students enter the

Addressing the school-to-prison pipeline requires focusing on where it begins: a neglected and under-resourced public education system (NAACP, 2005). Research has confirmed that fewer attention and resources to students yield poor

Although based on the adult criminal justice system, the juvenile justice process works differently. Juveniles can end up in court by way of arrest, truancy or for curfew violations or running away. A youth may also be referred to the juvenile court system by school officials or a parent or guardian for being continuously disobedient. The juvenile justice process involves several different steps including intake, detention, adjudication, disposition and aftercare following release from a juvenile correctional facility. In this paper we will breakdown the numerous steps involved in the juvenile justice process as well as compared some

The zero tolerance policy has become a national controversy in regards to the solid proven facts that it criminalizes children and seems to catch kids who have no intention of doing harm. Although, there has been substantial evidence to prove that the policies enforced in many schools have gone far beyond the extreme to convict children of their wrongdoing. The punishments for the act of misconduct have reached a devastating high, and have pointed students in the wrong direction. Despite the opinions of administrators and parents, as well as evidence that zero tolerance policies have deterred violence in many public and private schools, the rules of conviction and punishment are unreasonable and should be modified.