Disabling the School-to-Prison Pipeline interrogates how the school-to-prison pipeline operates for young people receiving special education services. Interviews with those directly affected suggest new ways of thinking about the problems facing special education.

Young people who have received special education services in the United States are vastly overrepresented in juvenile and adult criminal justice systems relative to their numbers in the general population. Although much existing research blames individual kids for getting arrested, school-level policies and practices affect a variety of student outcomes, including involvement with the justice system. These school-level policies and practices can—and should—be altered by teachers, administrators, and policy makers to reduce the number of young people getting arrested. Disabling the School-to-Prison Pipeline uses administrative data from New York City public schools and interviews with young people who have received special education services in NYC public schools and been arrested to better understand how schools can help or harm students receiving special education services. Schools cannot fix all problems associated with the criminal justice system in the United States; however, we can certainly expect schools not to make existing problems worse. This book identifies school-level policies and practices that may lead to negative outcomes for students, such as getting arrested, and suggests alternatives.

Being Bad will change the way you think about the social and academic worlds of Black boys. In a poignant and harrowing journey from systems of education to systems of criminal justice, the author follows her brother, Chris, who has been designated a “bad kid” by his school, a “person of interest” by the police, and a “gangster” by society. Readers first meet Chris in a Chicago jail, where he is being held in connection with a string of street robberies. We then learn about Chris through insiders’ accounts that stretch across time to reveal key events preceding this tragic moment. Together, these stories explore such timely issues as the under-education of Black males, the place and importance of scapegoats in our culture, the on-the-ground reality of zero tolerance, the role of mainstream media in constructing Black masculinity, and the critical relationships between schools and prisons. No other book combines rigorous research, personal narrative, and compelling storytelling to examine the educational experiences of young Black males. Book Features: The natural history of an African American teenager navigating a labyrinth of social worlds. A detailed, concrete example of the school-to-prison pipeline phenomenon. Rare insightsof an African American family making sense of, and healing from, school wounds. Suggested resources of reliable places where educators can learn and do more. “Other books have focusedon the school-to-prison pipeline or the educational experiences of young African American males, but I know of none that bring the combination of rigorous research, up-close personal vantage point, and skilled storytelling provided by Laura in Being Bad.” —Gregory Michie, chicago public school teacher, author of Holler If You Hear Me, senior research associate at the Center for Policy Studies and Social Justice, Concordia University Chicago “Refusing to separate the threads that bind the oppressive fabric of contemporary urban life, Laura has crafted a story that is at once astutely critical, funny, engaging, tearful, dialogue-filled, profoundly theoretical, despairing, and filled with hope. Being Bad is a challenge and a gift to students, families, policymakers, soon-to-be teachers, social workers, and ethnographers.” —Michelle Fine, distinguished professor, Graduate Center, CUNY "Perhaps more than any other study on this topic, this book brings to life the complicated, fleshed, lived experience of those most directly and collaterally impacted by the politics of schooling and its relationship to our growing prison nation.” —Garrett Albert Duncan, associate professor of Education and African & African-American Studies, Washington University in St. Louis

Examines the relationship between the law and the school-to-prison pipeline, argues that law can be an effective weapon in the struggle to reduce the number of children caught, and discusses the consequences on families and communities.

This book offers a research and comparison-driven look at the school-to-prison pipeline, its racial dynamics, the connections to mass incarceration, and our flawed educational climate—and suggests practical remedies for change. How is racism perpetuated by the education system, particularly via the "school-to-prison pipeline?" How is the school to prison pipeline intrinsically connected to the larger context of the prison industrial complex as well as the extensive and ongoing criminalization of youth of color? This book uniquely describes the system of policies and practices that racialize criminalization by routing youth of color out of school and towards prison via the school-to-prison pipeline while simultaneously medicalizing white youth for comparable behaviors. This work is the first to consider and link all of the research and data from a sociological perspective, using this information to locate racism in our educational systems; describe the rise of the so-called prison industrial complex; spotlight the concomitant expansion of the "medical-industrial complex" as an alternative for controlling the white and well-off, both adult and juveniles; and explore the significance of media in furthering the white racial frame that typically views people of color as "criminals" as an automatic response. The author also examines the racial dynamics of the school to prison pipeline as documented by rates of suspension, expulsion, and referrals to legal systems and sheds light on the comparative dynamics of the related educational social control of white and middle-class youth in the larger context of society as a whole.

The only text to fully address the causes, impact, and solutions to the school-to-prison pipeline The expanded use of zero tolerance policies and security measures in schools has exponentially increased arrests and referrals to the juvenile courtsóoften for typical adolescent developmental behaviors and low-level misdemeanors. This is the first truly comprehensive assessment of the ìschool-to-prison pipelineîóa term that refers to the increased risk for certain individuals, disproportionately from minority and impoverished communities, to end up ensnared in the criminal justice system because of excessively punitive disciplinary policies in schools. Written by one of the foremost experts on this topic, the book examines school disciplinary policies and juvenile justice policies that contribute to the pipeline, describes its impact on targetedóboth intentionally and unintentionallyóchildren and adolescents, and recommends a more supportive and rehabilitative model that challenges the criminalization of education and punitive juvenile justice. The book outlines effective policies, interventions, and preventative efforts that can be used to improve school climates and safety. The author includes specific recommendations for delinquency, detention, and incarceration prevention. The text incorporates a vast store of empirical knowledge from all relevant fields of study and includes research citations for more in-depth study. Case examples illuminate the plight of adolescents enmeshed in these systems along with effective interventions. The book is a vital resource for undergraduate and graduate students of social work and criminal justice as well as for juvenile court and school personnel and policymakers. Key Features: Provides a comprehensive assessment of the school-to-prison pipeline Recommends a supportive and rehabilitative model that decriminalizes education and challenges punitive juvenile justice Written by one of the foremost national experts on this topic Identifies the major risk factors for involvement in the pipeline About the Author: Christopher A. Mallett, JD, PhD, MSW, is Professor and BSW Program Director, School of Social Work, Cleveland State University. He is licensed in Ohio as an attorney and independent social worker. His research focuses on children and adolescents with disabilities and their involvement with the mental health system, school districts (special education), child welfare, and juvenile courts, with a focus on the impact of comorbid problems and juvenile justice system outcomes. Dr. Mallett is a consultant whose expertise is nationally tapped by juvenile courts, school districts, and childrenís service agencies, including serving on the Schools to Juvenile Justice Technical Assistance Training Team (2013 to present) sponsored by the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (NCJFCJ). He has published over 55 journal papers, national training briefs, and book chapters, as well as a textbook, Linking Disorders to Delinquency: Treating High Risk Youth in the Juvenile Justice System (2013).

A trenchant and wide-ranging look at this alarming national trend, Disrupting the School-to-Prison Pipeline is unsparing in its account of the problem while pointing in the direction of meaningful and much-needed reforms. The “school-to-prison pipeline” has received much attention in the education world over the past few years. A fast-growing and disturbing development, it describes a range of circumstances whereby “children are funneled out of public schools and into the juvenile and criminal justice systems.” Scholars, educators, parents, students, and organizers across the country have pointed to this shocking trend, insisting that it be identified and understood—and that it be addressed as an urgent matter by the larger community. This new volume from the Harvard Educational Review features essays from scholars, educators, students, and community activists who are working to disrupt, reverse, and redirect the pipeline. Alongside these authors are contributions from the people most affected: youth and adults who have been incarcerated, or whose lives have been shaped by the school-to-prison pipeline. Through stories, essays, and poems, these individuals add to the book’s comprehensive portrait of how our education and justice systems function—and how they fail to serve the interests of many young people."