SAN DIEGO — Students and graduates across the county echoed concerns about police in schools and racial bias on campus.
A student-led campaign, San Diego Unified Defund School Police, has more than 2,000 signatures on change.org.
Students said Black students face law enforcement referrals at a much higher rate than white students in the district.
“Within San Diego Unified particularly, 66% of law enforcement referrals that were made in 2015 alone were made against Latinx and Black students,” said Endiya Griffin.
Department of Education Civil Rights Data Collection shows in 2015 47.9% Hispanic students received law enforcement referrals and Black students received 18.7%.
Griffin is a co-founder of the SDUSD's Black Student Union Coalition and a founder of the SDUSD Defund School Police campaign.
“It has been a long journey of fighting against police in schools,” said Griffin.
The students said they are not looking for police reform in the schools. Rather they want to remove police altogether on school campuses.
“It's actually quite contradictory to have bodies on campus that are meant to criminalize students,” said Huda Ahmed, a UCSD student and Crawford High School alum.
There is a national movement across the country to defund school police. This week, the board of education for the Los Angeles Unified School District - the largest district in California and second largest in the U.S. - voted against eliminating school police.
California State Superintendent of Public Instruction, Tony Thurmond, launched a task force to look into police in schools. The San Diego Unified School District Police Department, the second largest district in the state, has been asked to join the task force.
“We are hearing the community. We are listening to the community,” said SDUSD Police Chief Michael Marquez.
Students on the campaign said Black and Brown students are unfairly targeted. There’s a school-to-prison pipeline when it comes to punishment, such as juvenile hall when students get into trouble.
“The way that police acted with Black and Brown students on campus, that never gave me the sense of hope that we could all grow together and basically grow from this, which is why we call for the complete defunding of the police force,” said Nyaduoth Gatkuoth, a UCSD student and Morris High School alum.
The district said its school police are focused on restorative justice, and cites that arrests are down 79% in the last decade.
Students created a working list of six demands of the district with the intent of creating a more equitable and safe learning environment for all students, advocating that SDUSD divests completely from SDUSD P.D. They want the district to re-allocate funds to school-based social workers, psychologists, restorative justice practitioners or other mental behavioral health professionals.
Maureen Magee, a district spokesperson, said San Diego Unified School Police are not a substitute for counseling and mental health services and there five times the number of counselors - 231 - than school police (41 sworn officers) and it spends twice as much on its mental health department ($21 million) than on school police. The officers make up less than 1% of the annual budget, which was $1.7 million in 2017 through the elimination of Community Service Officers.
Students on the campaign said there are not enough counselors for the 239 school sites.
They also want to require teachers to take conflict-resolution and cultural sensitivity training and hire more Black, indigenous and other teachers of color. Finally, they want to create a community-driven process for completing a revised district safety plan. They are also calling to support AB 2772, which requires ethnic studies be a high school graduation requirement.
A district spokesperson said starting in the 2020-2021 school year, all students will need to complete an ethnic studies course to graduate.
“What we are doing with our work is making sure that conversation turns into real change,” said Omar Frederico of Gompers Preparatory Academy Senior.
The district said it has 41 sworn police officers, and 59% are minorities. In the last five years, it received 1,041 threats of violence and drug incidents in the schools are down 47% over the last five years.
“That speaks volumes as to why our work is so important and why it's so important for us to be on our schools,” said Marquez.
The District shared photos of the school police chief joining peaceful demonstrators during this time and said there are no complaints to quality assurance last year, alleging excessive force or racial profiling.
Students feel the only way to listen is to rid police on school campuses.
“Schools are supposed to be a place where we go, where we learn, where we grow. So, if the school environment is toxic for Black and Brown students, we won't feel welcome and we won't prosper,” said Tatiana Howell, SDUSD Defund School Police Co-Founder and Madison High School alum.
SDUSD Defund School Police is holding a march on July 2 from 12 -2 p.m. The location hast not been announced.
The District School Police Department will be meeting with the state task force on Tuesday.
