Boston sits at a crossroads when it comes to the daily presence of police in schools.
School officials in the city say they are considering shifting the school police force into a team of security specialists dressed not in uniforms, but polo shirts and cargo pants. School leaders are consulting with city officials and Boston police to reexamine whether school-based officers should retain the power to arrest students under a new statewide police reform law.
The proposed change could mean a major shift for the 43-year-old force.
Following George Floyd's murder by former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, and calls from Black Lives Matter, the ACLU and Citizens for Juvenile Justice, schools are accelerating the pace of change.
Four of the six candidates running for Boston mayor support removing police from schools. Elsewhere, school districts from Seattle to Denver and closer to home, in Worcester and Somerville, have taken steps to remove or reduce police presence in schools. Some Boston high schools currently employ not one but two officers full time.
"The ultimate goal of this ongoing work is to promote school safety while cultivating trust in the community, building strong relationships, and placing a greater focus on intervention and restorative justice practices," the school department said in a statement.
The sweeping police reform law that Gov. Charlie Baker signed last December eliminates the power of local departments to license special officers and lifts the requirement that districts have at least one school police officer, also known as a school resource officer (SRO). That includes the 63 police who work in Boston's public schools. Under the new law, they must be specially certified by the state's new Peace Officer Standards and Training Commission.
Aaron Kupchik, sociology professor at the University of Delaware, says research indicates that the changes are overdue. "There's no sound empirical evidence to show that having SROs prevents crime," he said.
That data holds true, whether it's a fight between students, a property crime or other relatively minor offenses, according to Kupchik. The evidence also suggests that schools with SROs have more of those problems than similar schools with comparable student bodies but without SROs. It is a disproportionate problem for students of color, who are arrested and treated more harshly by school police than their white peers, he says.
"There are more school disciplinary cases like suspensions. There are more arrests of students, and these problems are particularly acute for students of color, so it adds to racial inequity," Kupchick said.
Earlier this year, a school resource officer in Osceola County, Florida body slammed to the floor and knocked unconscious a 16-year-old Black girl. A task force there has recommended SROs wear body cameras. The case is also under investigation by the Orange-Osceola State Attorney’s Office.
Mo Canady, executive director of the National Association of School Resource Officers, says such incidents like the one in Florida and others swirling on social media tell only part of the story. Most school police officers take seriously their role of protecting and serving students, teachers and their families. Many officers work as both officers and coaches, mentors, even emergency preparedness planners, says Canady.
"Yes, we have some among our own ranks who do us no favors. The officer there [in] Minneapolis set policing back 100 years, I think. And it disgusted just about everybody I know who's in this field,” he said, referring to Chauvin.
While Canady does not support eliminating school police, he says reforms and training are needed, like taking a hard look at hiring practices and pay, which tend to be lower than street police.
His organization's training program, for example, helps officers reflect on the unconscious biases that may lead them to criminalize students of color. Its "triad" model trains school police as enforcers of school rules and the law, classroom presenters and informal counselors.
That last role raises questions for Leon Smith, executive director of Citizens for Juvenile Justice, a nonprofit based in Boston that has made the issue of school policing central to its work. Smith asked: Wouldn't a trained counselor, social worker or mental health professional be better suited for that role than an officer, particularly after a pandemic that has disproportionately upended the lives of Black and brown students?
"You know, we can't be naive and just assume the presence of a police officer is something that's going to be comforting," Smith said. "The presence of law enforcement — it's triggering to a lot of young people, particularly young people of color."
Smith said he supports removing police with the power to arrest from schools entirely and redirecting those funds toward support services for Black, Latino and special education students.
A Boston Teachers Union (BTU) resolution passed a year ago by its members called on the school system to "remove all police from schools including Boston School Police… and all other law enforcement. Furthermore BTU calls for BPS to invest the $4 million dollars it currently spends on the Boston School Police into mental health services and restorative justice practices in our schools."
Smith said he had not learned of proposed changes in the district's school policing.
"When the whole plan is revealed, I certainly hope it's more than substituting security [for police] and it becomes about embedding much deeper socio-emotional and behavioral supports for students," he said.
School officials say they will release more information about the proposals at the school committee meeting on June 9.
At a roundtable meeting last week, Boston School Police Chief Neva Coakley-Grice said the unit is considering a name change. She also noted that about 75 percent of the current officers are Black or Latino.
Coakley-Grice said that the district has been considering a hybrid policing model, with some — but not all — school officers having police powers, including arresting people.
In Somerville, the school committee recently voted to freeze a resource officer position at its high school. It will also pause a program that allowed city police to mentor classes beginning in sixth grade.
Parents who lobbied for the changes are part of a group called "Justice 4 Flavia." They had rallied around Flavia Perea, whose young son of color was the subject of a police inquiry after he allegedly touched a female classmate inappropriately in school. He was 6-years-old at the time.
Parents initiated a letter-writing campaign to Somerville city officials and marched to expunge any police record. Perea says without community action, children like her son become statistics in the school-to-prison pipeline.
"We've got the Black Lives Matter sign over City Hall, the city has declared systemic racism a public health and safety emergency," she said. "But it's one thing to make those declarations. It's another thing to actually, you know, walk the walk."
