"Education Under Arrest" with Tavis Smiley

Last night I attended a screening of a PBS film by Tavis Smiley at Center Scene at the California Endowment.  The film will be shown on PBS stations around the country next Tuesday night at 8:00 PM PDT.  The documentary film was about the "school to prison pipeline" that is occurring particularly with the advent of specialized schools for special interest and gifted students like Charter and Magnet Schools.  Also, since class sizes have grown, the teacher and principal can get rid of the challenging student by kicking them out...calling the school police...and the student begins his criminal career.

The film shows alternative high schools....run with great control and discipline...for the kicked out students.  These probation like schools have been successful.

A panel discussion followed with Tavis, Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers and Manuel Coriollo, Community Rights Campaign organizer sponsored by the Labor Community Strategy Center in L.A.  Manuel advocates for kicked out students and demands services instead of jail.  Randi stated that what we need are resources....alternatives to juvenile prison such as counseling, restorative justice services and front end preventative programs to help the students to succeed and deal with the anger they are carrying inside because they feel hurt and ashamed of their poor skills.  They said that "Zero Tolerance" has sent youth to jail and it needs to be reviewed and challenged.

The Community Rights Campaign Demands:
.  Decriminalize tardiness, truancy and school attendance.
.  Decriminalize all student discipline:  end all zero tolerance discipline policies and reduce the role of police and courts in schools.
.  School police accountability though community oversight.
.  Transform school climate with supportive pro-active, mental health centered, ethnically relevant school-based supports and interventions, including counseling, peer mediation and restorative conflict resolution.

Below is a photo of Dr. Robert Ross, President of the California Endowment, introducing Tavis Smiley.  Tavis has had a nightly interview program on the L.A. public television station for 10 years and has co-authored a recent book on poverty in American with Dr. Cornell West.