New CCSD policy is a holdover, continuation of Obama-era

Frank Russo’s excellent letter to the editor “New Clark County School District discipline policy is ridiculous” captures part of the dangers of the new policy but may not go far enough. The new policy is a holdover and continuation of the Obama-era policy that contributed directly to the mass shooting at Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

This program is known as the Promise Program in Broward County and is based on an Obama Department of Education policy from 2014. This policy assumes that discipline in public schools is inherently race-based and that this cycle of racial discrimination is the primary cause of minority lifelong recidivism rates. The program incentivizes schools to minimize discipline responses for nonviolent infractions. This includes not reporting criminal activity to proper authorities.

In Broward County, all of the authorities responsible for handling criminal activities by minors signed up to this policy, including the sheriff and the School Board. Everyone with any potential to prevent Nikolas Cruz from killing 17 of his fellow citizens agreed to minimize reaction and discipline to his prior activities and behavior.

There is a direct line from the Department of Education’s incentive program, designed with the assumption that all education-related discipline is somehow infected with racism to the mass shooting at Stoneman Douglas High School. How many Clark County schoolchildren and teachers will die because of this new policy? How many of the education and law enforcement authorities who have agreed to continue another failed Obama policy will be held accountable when our children are dying in the hallways?