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school
safety

Approximately half of public K-12 schools have an armed police officer, commonly known as a School Resource Officer (SRO), stationed on campus. But evidence shows that school-based police do not reduce gun-related or other violence and instead fuel suspensions, expulsions, and arrests, and increase potential involvement with the criminal legal system. This school-to-prison pipeline disproportionately impacts disabled students and students who are Black, Latinx, Indigenous, and/or LGBTQ+.

Alternative public health strategies, such as social-emotional learning, counselors, school diversion measures, and restorative justice initiatives, can foster young people’s development and contribute to a welcoming school climate.

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Do We Need Police in Schools?
Creating Safety for All Students

Our webinar brings together activists and scholars to discuss the benefits of reducing the footprint of police in schools.
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data by-the-numbers

Schools with designated police officers arrest students 3.5 times as often as those without.

Baltimore County Public Schools implemented a program to help school staff respond to and prevent behavioral crises that reduced suspensions by over 50% and cost, annually, only 5% of what they spend on police every year.

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States required K-12 schools to adopt alternatives to exclusionary discipline, including restorative justice.

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Decrease of School-based arrests in Iowa when replacing School Police with Restorative Justice Staff

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Black students are arrested as often as White students

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Disabled students are arrested as often as students without Disabilities

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Substantial and effective change in our collective approach to public safety can only be driven by community voice.

Resource LIBRARY

Student misbehavior that might otherwise be treated as a school disciplinary infraction is more likely to be reported as a “crime” if police are present.

Removing police from schools should be part of a holistic approach to school safety that includes investments in public health approaches, regulations limiting the role of law enforcement in school discipline, and a comprehensive reexamination of the policies and training that shape how school staff interact with students.

While school-based police focus on responding to problematic behavior after it happens, a comprehensive public health approach to school safety instead aims to preventively address the many factors that contribute to a lack of safety in K-12 schools.

Schools should not be places where police officers surveil children for lawbreaking, arrest children, or use force on them: The role of police at schools is to protect children against external threats, not to punish students’ misbehavior.

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