澳彩开奖

Here鈥檚 an idea for the adults who oversee our public schools: Let鈥檚 stop beating up schoolchildren, pepper-spraying them, tossing them out of the classroom, and jailing them for doing the normal things kids do.

Instead, let鈥檚 expel the cops.

This is far from a radical idea. What鈥檚 radical is allowing officers to roam school corridors and arrest children for breaking minor rules 鈥� or letting them pepper-spray students for what a federal judge in our lawsuit in Birmingham, Alabama, recently called 鈥渂acktalking鈥� and 鈥渃hallenging authority.鈥�

School boards and administrators across the country must open their eyes: The policy of delegating basic school discipline to the police 鈥� benignly known as 鈥渟chool resource officers鈥� 鈥� has proven to be an unmitigated disaster, particularly for children of color.

The 鈥� showing an officer knocking a black teenage girl backward out of her chair and dragging her across the classroom floor in Columbia, South Carolina 鈥� is just the latest exhibit in a growing mountain of evidence.

It鈥檚 not enough that the officer involved in the incident was fired 鈥� because this is not an isolated problem that can be fixed by rooting out a few poorly trained, racist or ill-tempered officers.

Rather, what we鈥檙e seeing are the predictable results of a much broader pattern of over-policing in society and, more specifically, in poor, African American communities. The physical abuse of children in school is just the tip of a very large iceberg that is freezing too many vulnerable children out of the opportunities they need and deserve.

Far more common than incidents of police brutality in schools are the everyday encounters with police that result in suspensions, expulsions and arrests that criminalize ordinary children.

The numbers are mind-boggling. In the 2011-12 school year, the latest for which statistics are available, school officials referred a whopping 260,000 students to law enforcement, and . That same year, from school, and another 130,000 were expelled.

Virtually all of the scholars who study this phenomenon have concluded that the militarization of schools, coupled with the advent of zero tolerance policies, has had a vastly disproportionate impact on children of color and those with disabilities. The results: more dropouts, more poverty, more incarceration, more alienation and despair.聽

My colleagues and I at the 澳彩开奖 have represented hundreds of African-American children sucked into this school-to-prison pipeline and seen the heartbreaking consequences up close.

After we investigated the school district in Meridian, Mississippi, the U.S. to stop what police were calling the 鈥渢axi service鈥� from the school to the local lockup. The 2012 suit alleged that children were being punished 鈥渟o arbitrarily and severely as to shock the conscience.鈥�

In Louisiana, we鈥檝e asked the Justice Department to intervene in our ongoing case against the Jefferson Parish school district. One black student there, an eighth-grader, spent six days locked up in juvenile detention for throwing Skittles candy at another student.

Another, a 10-year-old African-American girl with autism, ended up face down on the ground with an officer鈥檚 knee in her back and in handcuffs after having an outburst. Afterward, she asked her family members, 鈥�Why do they [police] hate me?鈥�

In Birmingham, a judge ruled earlier last month that police violated the constitutional rights of schoolchildren by using pepper-spray to deal with 鈥渘ormal鈥� adolescent behavior.

These examples are not outliers. They鈥檙e routine. It鈥檚 no wonder that so many children, particularly in minority communities, grow up to distrust police.

School systems must do better. We need to return discipline to teachers and other school officials, and rely on police only on rare occasions. When teachers encounter serious misbehavior they鈥檙e not equipped to handle, schools should deploy counselors, mental health professionals, social workers and others who can solve behavioral problems 鈥� not police officers with guns, pepper spray and handcuffs.

Rather than sowing the seeds of distrust between police and communities of color that is likely to last a lifetime, schools should be teaching children to resolve conflict and be responsible citizens.

Some school districts are beginning to change. In Broward County, Florida, for example, administrators have instituted that limit the role of police, and they have seen large decreases in arrests, suspensions and expulsions.

How many more students will we allow to be pummeled by police, sprayed in the face with mace, or thrown behind bars for childish misbehavior before we take the necessary steps to ensure our schools are a place for learning instead of a fast track to prison?聽