Examines the relationship between the law and the school-to-prison pipeline, argues that law can be an effective weapon in the struggle to reduce the number of children caught, and discusses the consequences on families and communities.

This edited volume focuses on the role that school climate and disciplinary practices have on the educational and social experiences of students of color.

The only text to fully address the causes, impact, and solutions to the school-to-prison pipeline The expanded use of zero tolerance policies and security measures in schools has exponentially increased arrests and referrals to the juvenile courtsóoften for typical adolescent developmental behaviors and low-level misdemeanors. This is the first truly comprehensive assessment of the ìschool-to-prison pipelineîóa term that refers to the increased risk for certain individuals, disproportionately from minority and impoverished communities, to end up ensnared in the criminal justice system because of excessively punitive disciplinary policies in schools. Written by one of the foremost experts on this topic, the book examines school disciplinary policies and juvenile justice policies that contribute to the pipeline, describes its impact on targetedóboth intentionally and unintentionallyóchildren and adolescents, and recommends a more supportive and rehabilitative model that challenges the criminalization of education and punitive juvenile justice. The book outlines effective policies, interventions, and preventative efforts that can be used to improve school climates and safety. The author includes specific recommendations for delinquency, detention, and incarceration prevention. The text incorporates a vast store of empirical knowledge from all relevant fields of study and includes research citations for more in-depth study. Case examples illuminate the plight of adolescents enmeshed in these systems along with effective interventions. The book is a vital resource for undergraduate and graduate students of social work and criminal justice as well as for juvenile court and school personnel and policymakers. Key Features: Provides a comprehensive assessment of the school-to-prison pipeline Recommends a supportive and rehabilitative model that decriminalizes education and challenges punitive juvenile justice Written by one of the foremost national experts on this topic Identifies the major risk factors for involvement in the pipeline About the Author: Christopher A. Mallett, JD, PhD, MSW, is Professor and BSW Program Director, School of Social Work, Cleveland State University. He is licensed in Ohio as an attorney and independent social worker. His research focuses on children and adolescents with disabilities and their involvement with the mental health system, school districts (special education), child welfare, and juvenile courts, with a focus on the impact of comorbid problems and juvenile justice system outcomes. Dr. Mallett is a consultant whose expertise is nationally tapped by juvenile courts, school districts, and childrenís service agencies, including serving on the Schools to Juvenile Justice Technical Assistance Training Team (2013 to present) sponsored by the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (NCJFCJ). He has published over 55 journal papers, national training briefs, and book chapters, as well as a textbook, Linking Disorders to Delinquency: Treating High Risk Youth in the Juvenile Justice System (2013).

This book offers a research and comparison-driven look at the school-to-prison pipeline, its racial dynamics, the connections to mass incarceration, and our flawed educational climate—and suggests practical remedies for change. How is racism perpetuated by the education system, particularly via the "school-to-prison pipeline?" How is the school to prison pipeline intrinsically connected to the larger context of the prison industrial complex as well as the extensive and ongoing criminalization of youth of color? This book uniquely describes the system of policies and practices that racialize criminalization by routing youth of color out of school and towards prison via the school-to-prison pipeline while simultaneously medicalizing white youth for comparable behaviors. This work is the first to consider and link all of the research and data from a sociological perspective, using this information to locate racism in our educational systems; describe the rise of the so-called prison industrial complex; spotlight the concomitant expansion of the "medical-industrial complex" as an alternative for controlling the white and well-off, both adult and juveniles; and explore the significance of media in furthering the white racial frame that typically views people of color as "criminals" as an automatic response. The author also examines the racial dynamics of the school to prison pipeline as documented by rates of suspension, expulsion, and referrals to legal systems and sheds light on the comparative dynamics of the related educational social control of white and middle-class youth in the larger context of society as a whole.

A trenchant and wide-ranging look at this alarming national trend, Disrupting the School-to-Prison Pipeline is unsparing in its account of the problem while pointing in the direction of meaningful and much-needed reforms. The “school-to-prison pipeline” has received much attention in the education world over the past few years. A fast-growing and disturbing development, it describes a range of circumstances whereby “children are funneled out of public schools and into the juvenile and criminal justice systems.” Scholars, educators, parents, students, and organizers across the country have pointed to this shocking trend, insisting that it be identified and understood—and that it be addressed as an urgent matter by the larger community. This new volume from the Harvard Educational Review features essays from scholars, educators, students, and community activists who are working to disrupt, reverse, and redirect the pipeline. Alongside these authors are contributions from the people most affected: youth and adults who have been incarcerated, or whose lives have been shaped by the school-to-prison pipeline. Through stories, essays, and poems, these individuals add to the book’s comprehensive portrait of how our education and justice systems function—and how they fail to serve the interests of many young people."

“Revolution, not reform, is required to release the power of teaching .... Virtually, all teachers possess tremendous power which can be released, given the proper exposure. We can’t get to that point by tinkering with a broken system. We must change our intellectual structures, definitions and assumptions; then we can release teacher power.” (Hilliard, 1997) This book was written during a time of growing upheaval and disagreement about how America should educate its students, particularly those who are poor, diverse, and failing school. Dominant educational research, newspapers, and popular movies such as “Waiting for Superman” continually fuel public debates about whether our 21st century schools provide justice for all, decrease the achievement gap, and leave no child behind. However, even though one of teachers’ greatest concerns and why many leave the profession, classroom discipline is rarely brought to the forefront of discussion. As a result, public discourse does not get into what actually happens during disciplinary moments that ultimately leads to the disproportional tracking of particular students into exclusionary school disciplinary consequences, which funnels an underclass of students into the school-to-prison pipeline. This book is a scholarly study, presented here as a readable story, and practical guide for walking teachers, administrators, and teacher education programs through the process of transforming traditional ways of thinking about classroom discipline and teaching in order to create student-centered, creative, non-punitive classrooms that authentically engage the most alienated and oppressed students in our schools and society.

Young people who have received special education services in the United States are vastly overrepresented in juvenile and adult criminal justice systems relative to their numbers in the general population. Although much existing research blames individual kids for getting arrested, school-level policies and practices affect a variety of student outcomes, including involvement with the justice system. These school-level policies and practices can—and should—be altered by teachers, administrators, and policy makers to reduce the number of young people getting arrested. Disabling the School-to-Prison Pipeline uses administrative data from New York City public schools and interviews with young people who have received special education services in NYC public schools and been arrested to better understand how schools can help or harm students receiving special education services. Schools cannot fix all problems associated with the criminal justice system in the United States; however, we can certainly expect schools not to make existing problems worse. This book identifies school-level policies and practices that may lead to negative outcomes for students, such as getting arrested, and suggests alternatives.

SYSTEM FAILURE provides a framework for understanding the ways in which education policy across organizational settings contributes to the school-to-prison pipeline, as documented in the literature and as observed by authors in empirical studies of justice-involved youth in regular public schools, juvenile court schools, probation settings, and alternative schools. Burch and contributors argue that education policy fails low-income justice-involved youth in three major ways: maintaining silence around issues of structural racism and civil rights, marginalizing youth voice and culture and language, focusing on schools or the criminal justice system, and overlooking intermediate settings including the role of for-profit and not-for-profit education companies. While the problem of the school to prison pipeline has been well documented, the book adds critical detail and description of a policy process that tolerates the school-to-prison pipeline and stalls efforts to abolish it. The book is intended for educators, students, policymakers and practitioners interested in a comprehensive introduction to the policy issues as well as advocates doing serious work on the issues.

This cutting-edge collection of essays presents to the reader leading voices within food justice, environmental justice, and school to prison pipeline movements. While many schools, community organizers, professors, politicians, unions, teachers, parents, youth, social workers, and youth advocates are focusing on curriculum, discipline policies, policing practices, incarceration demographics, and diversity of staff, the authors of this book argue that even if all those issues are addressed, healthy food and living environment are fundamental to the emancipation of youth. This book is for anyone who wants to truly understand the school to prison pipeline as well as those interested in peace, social justice, environmentalism, racial justice, youth advocacy, transformative justice, food, veganism, and economic justice.