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Yahoo!Last night, at an oddly convened hour, SBSD Board of Education approved the Gang Task Force request for $100,000 to train and then implant two "outreach workers" in the schools and community.
The Gang Task Force is a bureaucracy with the same agencies and promises as the Truancy Program, but in reality, it is a school-to-prison pipeline for Hispanic males who are struggling in the educational setting. School tests scores go up and special-needs service costs are saved, but the students are criminalized and families are traumatized by the unholy alliance between the school system and the District Attorney, police, and Probation offices.
Democratic education mandates engaged relevant and socially conscious curriculum in a cooperative and supportive environment, yet the Pipeline to El Puente (a toxic waste site owned by Bill Levy) is greased by the callous disregard toward ... outraged parents and ... suffering students. The "jail school" is outside the jurisdiction of U.S. Education Codes; the pipeline is an unjust "school-political complex."
Annette Cordero and Superintendent Sarvis must have read Shock Doctrine; they cited "urgency to DO SOMETHING about gang violence." Annette said it was like a bridge collapse and students were "in the water."
I responded by saying the unethical SBSD programs, policies, and practices push students over the edge, and anti-gang officers and dress codes are akin to sending in rescue workers who can't swim. This is Suicide Prevention Month; no one mentions the dozen students whose mental illness went undetected.
The Gang Task Force will train the outreach workers to solve problems, resolve conflicts, and mediate. Open Alternative School teaches our children those skills starting in kindergarten! Every day, there are class meetings.
If you want to modify student behavior, offer school programs and methodologies that are engaging and relevant to students. If you want to reduce gang activity, talk to the students, parents, and teachers and implement their suggestions. Please don't fund another agency bureaucracy to spout ridiculous rhetoric.
Please Google ACLU's School to Prison Pipeline, elect Jacqueline Inda and Kate Smith to the SBSD Board of Education. And teach our children to swim. –-Kate Smith
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I'm not sure what the Gang Task Force will do. I hope they do some good.
One thing I do know is the High Schools need to deal with the boys who are in gangs. Currently it appears they just kick them out and into El Puente or La Cuesta. That's bad policy and poor teaching.
El Puente needs to be closed.
Teachers need to have the flexibility to alter their curriculum to fulfill the needs for troubled, angry boys instead of being forced to cram unwanted state standards down their throats.
Let these boys work on cars and computers. Let them do art and explore creativity. Let them read car manuel's instead of Shakespeare.
Trying to make these boys conform to a militaristic structure isn't working. And it doesn't work in prison either.
Georgy (anonymous profile)
October 4, 2008 at 11:54 a.m. (Suggest removal)
http://www.aclu.org/crimjustice/juv/3555...
Georgy (anonymous profile)
October 4, 2008 at 12:04 p.m. (Suggest removal)
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