Archive for category: In the Spotlight

Last month during a state education board meeting, DESE commissioner Riley called Boston’s progress on implementing this plan “incomplete” (2). He noted empty staff positions across the district, including leaders for the multilingual education office, a “coordinator of problem resolution” to address school safety and parent concerns, and senior staffers for special education (2,3).

More than half of Boston’s schools were built before World War II and since 2007, only four projects for new renovations and schools – out of three dozen – have been approved (1). And BPS has not yet renovated school bathroom facilities throughout the city, despite pledging to do so under the SIP (2). The consequences of this disrepair are well-known: oppressively hot classroom temperatures, crumbling walls and ceilings, and exposure to environmental contaminants.

And yet, amid BPS’s mounting public and legal obligations, how have certain Boston leaders responded?

With calls for police.

Though BPS removed police from schools in 2021, four Boston city councilors published a public letter this past January urging Mayor Wu to reinstate police and metal detectors in schools (4). In their letter, the city counselors — Erin Murphy, Michael Flaherty, Ed Flynn, and Frank Baker — declared the need for these security measures despite acknowledging the public’s “differing opinions” surrounding their use.

But this isn’t a matter of “differing opinions.” 

Visible and physical security measures in schools have been overwhelmingly discredited. According to a report by Citizens for Juvenile Justice, an analysis of 15 years of metal detectors in schools came up with “insufficient evidence that their use decreased crime or violence in schools,” instead finding “their presence made students feel less safe” (5).  

Yet in their letter, Boston City Councilors labeled metal detectors “non-invasive.” This is far from reality: for those forced to walk through them every morning before they can learn, metal detectors are invasive – physically and psychologically. And when we make our schools feel like prisons, our children feel less secure. 

Police presence also has no positive impact on school safety outcomes, according to a meta-analysis of 12 studies done by the WestEd Justice & Prevention Research Center (6). Instead, Black and brown students are disproportionately targeted within their schools, specifically for low-level offenses that in no way require law enforcement (7). In a district where students of color make up 85% of student enrollment, placing police in schools would detrimentally diminish an encouraging learning environment.  

But there is another path Boston can take. Evidence-based approaches, centered around restorative justice and preventive measures, have been proven to reduce student arrests and foster a safe learning space. These include conflict resolution, personal reflection, community reconciliation, and more. And they’re not a new phenomenon: when Denver Public Schools implemented restorative practices in 2011, suspension rates decreased by 44% (8). 

These strategies would relieve our city councilors’ safety concerns by identifying the underlying causes of conflict instead of their visible outcomes. As Leon Smith, Executive Director of Citizens for Juvenile Justice, remarked, “It would be unfortunate to see Boston move in a regressive way, doubling down on approaches that research shows are not effective rather than shifting resources to approaches shown to both address student need and improve school safety and climate” (9).  

Fundamentally, not only does law enforcement ineffectively ensure school safety compared to restorative action, but it also fails to address the urgent dangers posed by Boston’s declining facilities. Police officers cannot protect students from exposure to asbestos or lead in the neglected buildings they patrol. Police officers cannot ventilate classrooms or keep them within tolerable temperatures. Students deserve real safety at school – not just the illusion of it. And with such blatant neglect on display, it would be outrageous to funnel crucial funding and resources toward failed law enforcement measures. 

To their credit, Boston has made recent progress in meeting their students’ needs. But that does not mean we cannot hold them accountable. This moment is crucial for Boston Public Schools, and we must be diligent. Using reactionary force does not ensure student safety in schools. And when the district is still struggling to serve all students, allocating time and resources toward ineffective discipline would only set them back. It’s time for Boston leaders to expand their definition of school safety and support investments that genuinely address our students’ needs.

Sources:

1. Massachusetts spends thousands more on school construction aid for white students than for students of color, https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/05/27/metro/massachusetts-school-construction-aid/
2. One year into school improvement plan, state official grades Boston’s progress ‘incomplete’: https://www.wbur.org/news/2023/06/27/boston-school-improvement-plan-one-year-later-progress-update
3. Another year, another incomplete grade for Boston Public Schools: https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/07/06/opinion/boston-public-schools-jeff-riley-blistering-criticism/
4. https://twitter.com/ErinforBoston/status/1611476972076507136
5. Mowen, Thomas and Freng, Adrienne. “Is More Necessarily Better? School Security and Perceptions of Safety among Students and Parents in the United States”. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7205221/
6. Stern, A., & Petrosino, A. (2018). What do we know about the effects of school-based law enforcement on school safety? San Francisco, CA: WestEd. https://www.wested.org/ resources/effects-of-school-based-law-enforcement-on-school-safety
7. Thurau, L. and Wald, J. Controlling Partners: When Law Enforcement Meets Discipline in Public Schools, 54 N.Y.L. Sch. L. Rev. 977 (2009-2010). https://digitalcommons.nyls.edu/ nyls_law_review/vol54/iss4/5/ 
8. Cregor, Matt and Damon T. Hewitt. “Dismantling the School-to-Prison Pipeline: A Survey from the Field.” (2011).
9. Boston Public Schools quietly negotiating with city police to formalize relationship: https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/02/16/metro/boston-public-schools-quietly-negotiating-with-city-police-formalize-relationship/

Then COVID-19 hit. Thousands lost jobs, fell sick, and struggled to stay afloat. The skyrocketing legal needs of Bay Staters overwhelmed existing services. Courthouses shuttered, shifting to conduct court hearings virtually over the phone and through Zoom.

At the beginning of the pandemic, MA Appleseed began exploring the impact these virtual hearings had on self-represented litigants. We chose to focus on small claims debt collection cases where self-representation is the norm and the consequences of a poor outcome can be severe. People can lose vital income, get saddled with a reduced credit score that haunts them for years, and even face threats of eviction or incarceration.

Law students from Western New England University gave up their school breaks, volunteering to spend hours observing virtual small claims sessions across the state. The students followed up by interviewing the litigants they observed, gaining more insight into their firsthand experience. With project partners, we examined the patterns and recurring problems that emerged from these observations.

This research project culminated in our most recent collaborative report, You’re Still Muted: Access to Justice Barriers in Massachusetts’ Virtual Small Claims Court. Our findings are all-too familiar. At every turn, those who are already the most vulnerable when interacting with the court – low-income litigants, individuals with disabilities, limited English proficient litigants – face barrier after barrier in their attempts to engage with the legal process and achieve a fair outcome. In addition to technology-related hurdles, like litigants dropping out of hearings unexpectedly, a lack of standardization across court practices increases accessibility problems. Deeply entrenched inequities embedded in financial and legal institutions and the compounding effects of the COVID-19 pandemic mean this disproportionately harms communities of color, further widening the racial wealth gap.

Lack of a law degree and the inability to afford to hire an attorney should never be the reason a person loses their livelihood, their home, or is driven deeper into poverty. And as a state with vast racial wealth inequality, taking steps to eliminate these barriers is critical.

Some of the changes we recommended are simple, such as requiring clerk magistrates to introduce themselves and explain their role at the start of every court session. Others may require more coordination, like working with local legal service providers to establish “lawyer for the day” programs where there aren’t any now. Several recommendations seek to remedy issues of basic fairness. For example, standardizing how we treat litigants who appear late to a remote session or fail to show up at all, whether they’re a well-financed debt collection company or a single mother without an attorney.

Solving this problem is possible and the potential benefits are enormous. A study from the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation found that closing the racial wealth gap would grow the state’s economy by $25 billion in just five years. When people successfully navigate the civil justice system and resolve their legal problems, they can break out of cycles of upheaval and help build stronger, thriving communities. As for the courts, improved accessibility during virtual hearings will increase court efficiency and improve public perception of the courts as a fair institution.   

Court systems across the country have a reputation for being slow to change. They are built on tradition and precedence. But the COVID-19 pandemic forced everyone to rapidly adapt in the face of emerging crisis. The Massachusetts Trial Court rose to that challenge and showed that it can be done – that change is possible. At the height of the pandemic, we saw how court staff and Court Service Center managers worked with creativity and dedication to meet the needs of the thousands of people who sought their help. Amid statewide aspirations for an equitable pandemic recovery and the reality that disparities burdening low-wage workers and communities of color have intensified, these efforts to transform the courts and meet the goal of “justice for all” must continue. 

Virtual court, in one form or another, is here to stay. The rapid transformation that the civil justice system went through has provided Massachusetts with a treasure trove of data, information, and powerful lessons about the role technology can play in our future, both good and bad. And unless the needs and experiences of our most vulnerable litigants are centered in that future, a fair outcome in court and all the collateral benefits that come with it – stability, prosperity, and opportunity – will remain accessible only to those able to afford it.