Resources

This report analyzes data from the U.S. Department of Education’s 2017-18 Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC), the 2019 California Racial and Identity Profiling Act (RIPA) Stops dataset, and data from Stockton Unified School District on police in schools. The data conclusively show harmful and discriminatory policing patterns in schools. School police contribute to the criminalization of tens of thousands of California students, resulting in them being pushed out of school and into the school-to-prison pipeline. Critically, the data suggest that schools underreport the number of assigned law enforcement officers, so these problems are likely even more severe.

Human Impact Partners joined with the Dignity Not Detention Coalition to create a resource outlining recommendations for what healthy, just, and supportive immigration policy can look like for unaccompanied youth immigrating to the US, without relying on detention or detention-like facilities.

This report profiles several jurisdictions that recently removed police from their schools and detail how communities were able to wage successful campaigns and the types of resources schools have implemented in place of law enforcement.

The question of whether police belong in schools has been a long-debated topic in the United States. With the increased focus on policing generally, the debate has grown more intense. Proponents argue that police can more effectively address student-to-student conflict, such as bullying, and increase overall safety in an age of recurring school shootings. Those who oppose argue that police in schools contribute to the school-to-prison pipeline and result in disparities based on race and/or disability in discipline and arrests, as well as a climate of fear for students of color. Speakers on this program present the data, discuss the impact of police in schools and examine this issue critically to confront the question of whether police in schools result in enhanced student safety.

Researchers have conducted hundreds of studies looking for effective ways to prevent and reduce violence, but the knowledge base is far from complete, especially as it relates to one important question: are there ways to prevent violence without relying on the police? The obvious answer is “yes.” Policing has never been the primary explanation for obviously varying levels of community safety. Residents of wealthy areas do not experience the intense police surveillance and enforcement imposed on poor neighborhoods. Yet, rates of violence are reliably lower in wealthy communities.

Arnold Ventures asked the John Jay College Research and Evaluation Center (JohnJayREC) to review the research evidence for violence reduction strategies that do not rely on law enforcement. The scan was carried out by an expert group of researchers from the fields of public policy, criminology, law, public health, and social science. The members of the research group worked collaboratively to identify, translate, and summarize the most important and actionable studies.

Though the campaign ended in 2019, this organizing toolkit was developed over the past year plus by #NoCopAcademy youth and adult alumni who wanted to share out how we did what we did (because people kept asking us), to document our work, and to share it with the hundreds and thousands of young people taking action today to defund policing, get cops out of our schools, and build abolitionist futures. Campaigns are an important tool for building power, and we wanted to break down all the parts that went into ours.

In the wake of the recent conviction of Derek Chauvin and the police killing of Daunte Wright, a new nationwide survey by BSG sheds light on the factors that contribute to public safety and reveals an overwhelming public support to reallocate police funds for a wide range of public safety proposals. The research also illuminates American’s perceptions around police accountability and de-escalation training.

A collection of resources about campus policing and ways to get cops off campus.

Mennonite Church USA (MC USA) received requests across the denomination to provide an Anabaptist grounded resource for clergy and congregations to engage in learning about the call for police abolition. When we confess “Jesus is lord” we are leaving behind systems that operate by coercion, violence and punishment. Mennonites have long recognized that following Jesus occurs in our bodies and with our lives. We remove ourselves from military service because we refuse to harm or kill people at the direction of the state. We affirm that all people are made in the image of God. We believe that it is incumbent upon the church to discuss and discern policing as another form of state-sanctioned violence.

This curriculum is an initial guide for congregations who are desiring to begin or continue their reflection on what it means to engage the forces of state, their commitments to non-violence and how to act to end policing and police brutality.