United States | News & Politics

I fully expected to read this and then be mad at Kamala; I'm not. This really doesn't sound bad to me. They're just making work the secret service has done to non-invasively figure out who to keep an eye / who might be an assassin available to schools.

These are the criticisms:

The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights: Threat assessment, including as proposed in this legislation, poses major risks for and to students, including increased and early contact with law enforcement, overidentification of students … for ‘threatening’ behavior, distraction from the role of easy access to guns in enabling mass shootings in schools and elsewhere, and undermining of students’ rights under civil rights laws, including the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and Section 504. School safety belongs in the hands of educators, and those trained in child/adolescent development — not law enforcement, and we should never start from a place of viewing some children as threats.

The Consortium for Constituents With Disabilities: The U.S. Secret Service is part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security — a border security and counterterrorism agency. This agency has no expertise in student behavior or child development. Nonetheless, they would develop best practices and train school staff on threat assessment, treating children as potential terrorists.

I get that law enforcement isn't popular with a lot of folks right now. However, there's no way to solve this problem legally without someone to actually enforce the law. Nobody's saying that they're going to place Randy from the town police office with a weapon in your school.

School safety belongs in the hands of educators

If you look at what the opponents are actually saying here, they're proposing "teachers are law enforcement." That burden absolutely should not fall on educators. Educators are there to teach; they are not a safety force, they never have been, and attempts to make them some kind of police for student safety have IMO been unsuccessful at best. They should not be the ones dealing with bullying issues or gun violence. They do not need further overloaded with even more responsibilities when there are counselor and safety personnel positions that should be created and filled with people who are actually qualified.

not law enforcement, and we should never start from a place of viewing some children as threats

There's a lot of presumption in their comment in general about how this is going to be applied. I can almost guarantee it's not going to be "there's a secret service agent in every school throwing kids in jail and interrogating them."

This is the start of the intervention program they're claiming they want; this is community policing with education on what to look out for (and that's just as much what not to look out for). This is IMO clearly not some attempt to railroad students into prisons.

The Consortium for Constituents With Disabilities: The U.S. Secret Service is part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security — a border security and counterterrorism agency. This agency has no expertise in student behavior or child development.

Considering the threat of domestic terrorism and the rise in youth violence, I'd say they absolutely should become experts on student behavior and child development if they're not already looking at that now.

I am concerned about the ACLU sign on and the studies that police intervention negatively impacts graduation rates. However, I think we need to research why that's happening and how to fix it. These studies (from a quick look) attack the angle that these things are a consequence of increased intervention/disciplinary action. The answer to that problem isn't to remove enforcement, under report it, and let more people that are beating the crap out of their peers get away with it.

I hope the criticism here from these civil rights organizations can be used to improve law enforcement, further that conversation, and examine what can constructively be done to address the issues facing students, the issues facing educators, and the issues facing minorities around the country.