prisons

School Cuts And 'Reforms' Feed The Prison Pipeline

Jeff Bryant — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 12:37:45 -0400

As educators close out this school year and go into planning mode for the next, what many of them truly dread is the fiscal nightmare being handed to them by miserly state governments who've decided to balance their budgets on the backs of helpless school children.

According to a new survey conducted by the American Association of School Administrators, three-quarters of school districts will be eliminating jobs in 2011-12, sending nearly a quarter of a million of the nation's public school educators and their support staff into the ranks of the unemployed.

Now that state legislators and governors have passed their decrees, someone has to do the actual dirty work of deciding who, what, and how to slash from the payroll and withhold from the starving public. So many school administrators are grasping for unheard of straws.

One creative idea coming from a New Jersey school district is to charge student teachers fees to do their internships.

Another stroke of genius comes from the city of Riverside, California where administrators found themselves with a sparkling new "high-tech" high school on their hands but then weren't given adequate resources to staff it. A helpful tip from school leaders in Florida: get rid of art and music teachers for low-income kids.

But the funding idea that truly takes the cake comes from a school superintendent in Michigan who wrote the state's conservative governor Snyder requesting to have his school converted into a prison. It's pretty hard to argue with his logic:

[ . . . ] I’m proposing to make my school a prison. The State of Michigan spends annually somewhere between $30,000 and $40,000 per prisoner, yet we are struggling to provide schools with $7,000 per student. I guess we need to treat our students like they are prisoners, with equal funding. Please give my students three meals a day. Please give my children access to free health care. Please provide my school district Internet access and computers. Please put books in my library. Please give my students a weight room so we can be big and strong. We provide all of these things to prisoners because they have constitutional rights. What about the rights of youth, our future?!

The letter got handed around a lot (see here, here, and here)with noteworthy comments about the raw deal that our country continues to give to poor kids. But what's especially striking in the letter is where the superintendent crosses the line from irony to deadpan clarity with his plea to "please provide for my students in my school district the same way we provide for a prisoner. It's the least we can do to prepare our students for the future...by giving our schools the resources necessary to keep our students OUT of prison."

It's all too fitting that the superintendent's direct comparisons of schools to prisons comes on the heels of a report from the NAACP questioning our nation's misplaced priorities that favors incarceration over education. Echoing the report's alarm, Lindsay McCluskey, President of the United States Student Association, writes at Huffington Post that the US has the enviable position of being the world's leading prison warden, with 2.3 million people behind bars, outdistancing even China that has a population four times greater than ours, yet imprisons one million fewer people, "even with its draconian criminal laws."

The relationship of schools to prisons is inextricable. In an article by Sam Dillon, one of the few real education journalists still writing at the national level, researchers at Northeastern University found that "on any given day, about one in every 10 young male high school dropouts is in jail or juvenile detention, compared with one in 35 young male high school graduates."

Not only do dropouts more frequently end up in jail, but they're far more apt to be unemployed. The report, Dillon highlights, "puts the collective cost to the nation over the working life of each high school dropout at $292,000."

But dropout rates alone don't tell the whole story of how mistaken policies governing the nation's public education system end up feeding the "School to Prison Pipeline."

As the American Civil Liberties Union explains, "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, and even textbooks, lock students into second-rate educational environments." (emphasis in orginal)

Worsening the situation are "zero tolerance" policies that call for harsher penalties, such as suspensions and expulsions and involvement of law enforcement, for school infractions, regardless of the intent of the student and the circumstances involved.

Recent reports from Philadelphia and Texas, have concluded these strong discipline policies tend to "push out" the most difficult students and much more often turn school infractions over to the criminal justice system for resolution.

Accountability mandates from the so-called reform movement have also done much to feed the School to Prison Pipeline. As this recent report from a collaborative effort involving research, education, civil rights and juvenile justice organizations concluded, academic "get tough" policies such as the current emphasis on high-stakes standardized tests that originated with No Child Left Behind "have led to more students being left even further behind."

“By focusing accountability almost exclusively on test scores and attaching high stakes to them," explains George Wood of the Forum for Education and Democracy, "NCLB has given schools a perverse incentive to allow or even encourage students to leave.”

Adds FairTest's, Monty Neil, "NCLB has led to the dramatic narrowing and weakening of curriculum. Because so much of the school day is focused on test preparation instead of well-rounded instruction, more students become alienated, making the jobs of teachers even harder.”

Given these "perform or else" mandates that "reformers" want to continue to enforce on schools, school leaders in fact are often rewarded for pushing out their more academically troubled students. For instance, the Chicago Tribune recently published an article lauding high school principal Kenyatta Stansberry for "get tough" policies that led to a dramatic "turnaround" on state test scores. Stansberry "affectionately nicknamed 'the Marine,'" has indeed put into place a new school climate that has led to significantly higher test scores and better attendance, and she certainly is to be admired for that. What gets buried in the nineteenth paragraph, however, is that "she talked to neighboring principals to take in her most difficult students. Thirty percent of Harper students would end up leaving."

Then deep into the copy on page two is another detail:

The school found 213 students -- nearly a third of the student body -- behind in credits, and when the school announced that social promotion was essentially ending, and 18-to-20-year-old seniors would be held back, many students pulled out. In all, the school estimates it lost 161 students -- 104 of them transferred to other schools, and 34 signed up at Youth Connections alternative schools."

So is that how schools should be more "accountable?" By relocating problem students elsewhere? No doubt all those "difficult students" end up somewhere. And while it might be reasonable to challenge the merits of "social promotion," there's little doubt that some of those students who were pushed out for not measuring up will get "socially promoted" anyway -- to prison.

And although Tribune reporter, Noreen S. Ahmed-Ullah, was competent in presenting these facts, shouldn't she have at least explained the importance of them? And also maybe been less blatantly enthusiastic about this "miracle turnaround?"

In a similar vein, President Obama just rewarded a Memphis, Tennessee high school with an in-person commencement address because of how well the school had performed in the administration's signature Race to the Top initiative, due in part to the school's success in reducing dropout rates. But when intrepid edu-blogger, Gary Rubenstein took a closer look, what he found was that "the ‘miracle’ seemed to be one of creative math." As the ever useful Valeri Strauss highlighted from Rubenstein's post, one of the ingredients in the school's abilities to improve graduation rates was a high rate of student attrition (25 percent!) that occurred during the same time, including some 200 students "who were less likely to graduate."

It's time for political leadership in this country to wake up to the reality. Deep cuts and harsh mandates pushed onto our schools end up costing elsewhere. Much like how businesses try to externalize the costs of the waste and pollution they cause onto government clean-up efforts, our current leaders in state houses and DC are trying to externalize the cost of education, especially when it applies to poor, high-needs children. And we all end up paying more somewhere else down the line.

The Census and Democracy: Maryland Fixes a Major Error

Eric Lotke — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 08:57:25 -0400

In the wake of the 2010 Census, Maryland passed a law yesterday that fixes a major problem. Maryland will now count people in prison where they actually live, not where they are confined. This first-in-the-nation law will improve the fairness and accuracy of Census data used to draw legislative boundaries.

18 percent of the population credited to Maryland House of Delegates District 2B (near Hagerstown) is actually incarcerated people shipped in from other parts of the state. In Somerset County, 64 percent of the population in the First Commission District is a large prison, giving each resident in that district nearly three times as much influence as residents in other districts. People in prison are generally not permitted to vote, but their bodies still count for purposes of legislative apportionment.

The problem goes beyond Maryland. The official rule of the U.S. Census Bureau is to count people where they are confined – even though most people sent to prison were convicted of relatively minor crimes and will serve less than three years, returning to their actual homes long before the next decennial census. The misplaced headcount distorts democracy.

The effect has racial and ethnic consequences as well. More people in prison come from urban, minority, Democratic-leaning districts. They are sent to prisons in rural, white, Republican-leaning districts. It’s not quite a return to the three-fifths clause, but the electoral impact leans in that direction. Nationwide, more than ten percent (pdf, table 19) of African American men in their twenties and thirties wakes up in custody in any given day. When I ran the numbers in 2005, the figure in Baltimore was one in five. These numbers are too high for all kinds of reasons – but the impact on redistricting carves it into the bones of our democracy.

Still, the Census Bureau has stubbornly refused to change its rules and count people in prison in the location that they come from and return to. It has conceded for the 2010 census to release its micro data early enough that states and counties who choose to can reassess prison jurisdictions in time for reapportionment. But Maryland sets a new standard by taking matters into its own hands. Technical matters of implementation will need to be worked out (they have ten years!) but the law states a clear legislative intent. Constituents are not exportable commodities.

Credit where due: Peter Wagner and the Prison Policy Initiative have been advocating for these changes for years. The New York Times has editorialized against it. And my own personal brag: I helped uncover this issue ten years ago, and published the first mainstream documentation in the Pace Law Review.

The governor and the legislature in Maryland just plain got it right. If enough other states follow their lead, the Census Bureau will have no choice but to do it right next time.

Good Building, Bad Building

Eric Lotke — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:16:13 -0500

China has opened a new subway system every year for the past six years. The U.S. has opened 40 new prisons and jails. Who’s setting up to lead in the 21st century?

“Expanding prisons mean more jobs,” explained the Fayetteville Observer over the summer.

The rural North Carolina community was celebrating the $19 million expansion of a $90 million prison that opened in 2003 and immediately filled to capacity. Such growth is a boon for rural, economically distressed counties. “Prison jobs bring added payroll, boost housing markets and draw new retail customers to poor parts of the state,” observed the Observer.

The good news is that public investment can work. The bad news is that better choices must be made. We need to distinguish between prisons for crime control and prisons as a jobs program, between building for the future and building for the past.

"We're always looking for ways to bring jobs to Wilkes County," said state senator Jim Whitehead of Georgia, when funding fell into place for a new pre-release center.
“This is the biggest thing to happen to Stewart County since I’ve been here,” said the chair of the county board when the private, for-profit Corrections Corporation of America opened a new 1,524 person detention center. “Everything’s been leaving rather than coming in the 10 years I’ve been here. The biggest thing this will do is provide jobs for the county and the area.”
Push state to build prison here,” editorialized the Altoona Mirror in central Pennsylvania, three weeks before the election. “What would the area do to obtain 600 well-paying jobs in what could be termed a recession-proof industry? It's not a rhetorical question. Those jobs could happen. But it's important that our local and state leaders don't drop the ball.”

President-elect Barack Obama is planning a massive new public works program. He wants to employ 2.5 million people rebuilding our roads and schools and bridges. That’s great. It’s more than great. We need the projects, we need the jobs, and the proposal is on the order of magnitude of the problem.

Part of the program could be a reconsideration of the role prisons play in our rural economy. That role seems to have taken on a life of its own.

“When folks here heard the governor wanted to close the 137-year-old Pontiac Correctional Center, sucking hundreds of jobs from the area, they mobilized in a way that only small towns can. They held rallies and a parade. Streets were lined with blue-and-white 'Save Our Prison' signs and residents were outfitted in T-shirts to match.” The local ABC news affiliate described it as “a struggle for their economic lives,” as the state considered closing the town's second-largest employer to help fill a $700 million hole in the state budget.

States are truly struggling. Forty-one states have already reported budget problems for the current or upcoming fiscal year, and it’s likely to get worse. States are starting to cut benefits and services ranging from health care to public schools and early childhood education.

But one budget item is never questioned: prisons.

Even as states spend nearly $50 billion on prisons every year and counties spend over $20 billion on jails, we build additional locked capacity. Even with U.S. incarceration rates at seven times historical and international norms, we build. Even as crime continues on its 15-year descent to levels not seen in 40 years, we find money to build even more.

The sacrifices we make to build these prisons are astonishing. Between 1987 and 2007, state spending on prisons increased by 40 percent (as a percent of the general fund). State spending on higher education decreased by 30 percent. We are financing our prisons by cutting our colleges.

We continue to build even though prisons are often disappointing for economic development. The best jobs go to people from out of town, and dollars spent on prisons have little “multiplier” effect. They don’t generate future additional dollars of economic activity, as do dollars spent on transportation, schools and so forth. Every dollar invested in highway construction generates $2.50 of gross domestic product in the short term. Raising teacher wages by 10 percent is associated with a 5 percent decrease in drop-out rates. But still we shortchange our schools and other rural enterprise, and build new prisons.

The solution is to recognize that prisons have an economic logic of their own. The Pentagon budget is understood as a combination of military necessity and commercial interests. We need to understand the appeal prisons offer to struggling rural communities in the same way.

The challenge is to break the link between prison as industry and prison as crime control. The challenge is to show a way out for governors and legislators who want to reduce the burden of the corrections budget but genuinely cannot because of the immediate and legitimate trouble it causes to their constituencies.

HERE'S HOW: As our new federal leaders develop plans for stimulus and infrastructure investment, they should self-consciously direct resources to break the link between prisons and the dependent rural economies. They should create a grant program to help states transition from prison economies to more productive uses.

People are ready for this kind of change. Way back in 1999, when there were half a million fewer people in American prisons and jails, John DiIulio, one of the main movers behind the prison explosion, said we had reached a point of diminishing returns. But we can’t change course; the transition costs are too high:

Drug treatment and prevention programs are cheaper in the long run, but they cost money up front to start.
Cost savings to some are job losses to others. Especially when the programs go to scale and entire prisons are shut down or construction projects avoided. What should people do in the interim?

That’s where federal assistance can come in. Part of the infrastructure/investment/stimulus money can be directed to cover transitional costs out of the prison economy. A few billion dollars of federal money in the short term can help states break the prison hammerlock, and free them to redirect tens of billions of state dollars to other purposes – from schools to roads to hospitals.

That’s the proposal: a federal grant program that helps states manage transitional costs in the short run. Much like the federal VOI/TIS Justice Department grant program helped build prisons in the 1990s, a transition grant program can help to unbuild them in the 2000s (perhaps best administered by the Commerce Department). Let the laboratories of democracy experiment over techniques, but the federal government can help ease the transition.

It’s a modest investment for the federal government that can yield substantial dividends quickly. But it needs to be consciously identified as a goal. Left alone the prison autopilot will continue to rise.

Today In Issues To Be Ignored

Bill Scher — Tue, 06 May 2008 12:08:08 -0400

Even when the media reports on a critical issue, the media ignores it.

Last week, NBC Nightly News aired a series on our crumbling infrastructure called "Falling Apart." (Check out the videos below, as well as my colleague Isaiah's post on rebuilding America.)

Yesterday, the Washington Post front-paged a story about how squeezed state budgets are forcing prison to release prisoners early, which speaks not only to how the recession is impacting government services, but also raises questions about our approach to crime.

And speaking of crime, today the New York Times reports that we still have stark racial disparities in drug arrests and incarcerations, even though there are no disparities in drug use.

All high-profile media placement. Yet none of the above reports have sparked broad discussion of these issues throughout the media.

The punditocracy is much more interested in stoking racial divisions by obsessing over the words of pastor not running for public office, instead of exploring what needs to be done to eliminate racial disparities in our society.

NBC can do solid journalism for a few minutes on the Nightly News about the problem of crumbling infrastructure. But none of the stable of MSNBC's pundits is given the opportunity to comment further and drive the national discussion about how the solve the problem, and no NBC political reporter presses candidates to tell the public what they would do.

Often when you take the media to task to cover a certain story, the response will be, "We did that!"

But media professionals know that's a cop-out, because a single piece of journalism collects dust on the shelf without other members of media using that journalism to enrich the discourse.

And once again, good journalism will be wasted, and critical issues continue to be ignored.

Check out the "Falling Apart" series below.

April 28: U.S. infrastructure facing midlife crisis

April 29: Why America's trains aren't taking off

April 30: Power grid barely makes the grade