By Tammie Lang Campbell
Shh! It’s against the law to talk back to your teacher in Texas.
Effective Sept. 1, a new law passed by the Legislature will intensify the school-to-prison pipeline cycle. Senate Bill 2432, a vague and discretionary law, will allow administrators to refer students to alternative disciplinary education programs if an employee perceives harassment from a student. According to the Texas Penal Code 42.07, harassment includes intent to harass, annoy, alarm, abuse, torment or embarrass a person by phone, electronic communications and/or online posts.
The inclusion of the harassment clause in the bill is a buried, one-sentence blurb that will prove to be dangerous for vulnerable, marginalized populations who are already victims of excessive punishment tactics fueling the school-to-prison pipeline. Unfortunately, some students who will receive punishment for perceived harassment may not commit the type of infraction lawmakers intended for this legislation to address.
This law is subjective. It allows too much unregulated and unchecked professional judgment. There are no safeguards against educators’ confirmation bias leading them to punish students who are traditionally labeled as aggressive. Students who are judged to be harassers will be assigned to disciplinary alternative education programs.
Confirmation bias is defined as tendency to interpret new evidence as confirmation of one’s existing beliefs or theories. In other words, if the data reveals that black students are more aggressive than their fellow students, then data can be used to continue the destructive pattern of over-punishing them.
Confirmation bias is often applied to marginalized students who are labeled as aggressive for stating opinions, while white students who do the same thing are tolerated because they are seen as being assertive.
Apparently it’s not enough to mislabel, destroy and push out vulnerable students from school. This bill adds accelerant to the arson of excessive discipline used to fuel the school-to-prison pipeline. Black students and students with disabilities are disproportionately disciplined in K-12 public schools, according to a 2018 report from the Government Accountability Office, the federal government’s nonpartisan watchdog arm.
In Texas, black students represent 13 percent of students in the state’s school districts and make up 31 percent of suspensions and 23 percent ofexpulsions, even though they don’t misbehave more. This means that black students are suspended and expelled at rates of about two times their representation.
The Legislature’s disregard for data and civil liberties leaves students vulnerable. Consider the following:
• Students who are suspended or expelled are more likely to repeat a grade or drop out of school, especially when over-disciplined.
• Excessive school discipline pushes student out of school and fuels the school-to-prison pipeline.
• The shortage of school social workers and counselors set students up for failure and limits critical resource needed to address and redirect inappropriate behavior.
• This law does not require teachers to take additional bias training that would help them deal with confirmation or implicit bias in making decisions.
• This law does not mandate tracking or monitoring the effectiveness of referring students to alternative disciplinary education programs.
Passing this law is a disservice to students whose parents are paying taxes to send their children to school to learn how to properly interact with others, not to be criminally punished and pushed out of school for immature behavior.
What’s particularly troubling about this unfair law is that it holds students more accountable than teachers and other school employees.
As we begin a new school year, educators must work against their own biases to counter the disproportionate suspensions and expulsions of black students and students with disabilities. Parents need to be vigilant about protecting their children from being mislabeled.
Campbell is founder and executive director of the Honey Brown Hope Foundation and former president of the NAACP-Missouri City and Vicinity Branch.