澳彩开奖

I hope you about important new Department of Education data on the crisis that鈥檚 playing out in our public schools.

Here鈥檚 the bottom line: African-American children are three times more likely to be suspended and expelled from school than their white peers.

Of course, this comes as no surprise. We鈥檝e been fighting the 鈥�school-to-prison pipeline鈥� for years, bringing case after case to reform 鈥渮ero tolerance鈥� policies that amount to a war on our nation鈥檚 children.

Outrageously, many children pushed out of school are sent into juvenile lockups for trivial offenses. Too often, they鈥檙e traumatized, brutalized, isolated and neglected in these facilities.

The message we send to them is that no one cares.

And for what? In a great number of cases, they鈥檝e done nothing but violate school rules.

In one of our cases, a student in Mobile County, Alabama, was suspended for 50 days because his shirt was untucked. In another, a 14-year-old in Meridian, Mississippi, spent several days locked up because he had .

We need to do better for our children 鈥� and for our country鈥檚 future.

We must keep children in the classroom and stop criminalizing typical adolescent behavior. We must work harder to create safe, nurturing learning environments. And, yes, we must recognize and combat the insidious role of racial bias in school discipline.

On May 17, our nation will mark the 60^th anniversary of Brown v. Board, the landmark Supreme Court decision that outlawed school segregation.

There鈥檚 much to celebrate.

But, as this data shows, even after six decades, traces of Jim Crow segregation continue to linger. And it鈥檚 devastating to African-American communities, who see their children鈥檚 futures cast aside as they are earmarked for dropout and incarceration.

We can do better. For all of our children鈥檚 sake, we must.