http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/10/29/1441851/-In-California-Black-Minds-Matter-Elsewhere-black-bodies-not-so-much?detail=email
According to Ryan Smith, executive director of the organization, "Our job as parents, community members, and educators is to do everything possible where students can learn. Threats of violence and aggression, particularly from police officers, hinders students progress, it does not support it."
In South Carolina, the Richland County Sheriff’s Department is the agency in charge of providing "school resource officers," the name given to police in schools, at Spring Valley High School where Ben Fields was employed. More than 20,000 police officers are estimated to serve as school resource officers nationally.
"Defiance" and "disturbance" are the most common reasons cited for suspensions and expulsions of black youth, pushing them out of schools and toward incarceration. In Vallejo, California, during the 2013-14 school year for example, 70 percent of black students were suspended in school for "willful defiance" while 30 percent of the students in Vallejo City Unified School District are African American, according to Education Trust-West. The New York Times reports that black students are 59 percent of the student population and 77 percent of those suspended in South Carolina's Richland County.
The Richland Two Black Parents Association has been working to implement a discipline code in the schools that removes law enforcement as the first point of contact for peaceful students who may have violated the code.
The "Black Minds Matter" report also lists as one of its recommendations "providing a broad range of health, wellness, and socio-emotional supports" to meet the physical, mental and emotional needs of black students.
The Spring Valley teenager assaulted by Fields is currently in foster care. Fields’ attack on the as-yet-unidentified student was not only traumatic to her, but to her fellow students.
Which is why looking at this incident from a health and wellness lens is also crucial. So says Mark-Anthony Johnson of Dignity and Power Now (DPN). DPN is a Los Angeles-based grassroots organization fighting for the human rights of incarcerated people, their loved ones, and communities. As part of that fight, the group is committed to ensuring that law enforcement does not rebrand itself as a service provider akin to mental health providers or school counselors.
"There’s a long history of anti-black, state-sanctioned violence of which the purpose was to not only harm somebody, but also, harm the people around them. What was lynching about? It wasn’t just about harming one person but harming a community; it was a form of psychological warfare," said Johnson.
Johnson is the director of health and wellness for DPN. He continued: "Using trauma to incapacitate people, that’s what we see in this moment. You have this police officer who throws this black child across the classroom, in front of these other children. That is sending a message to these other students: 'This is what awaits you if you are not compliant.' That is an intentional demonstration of power. That’s part of the trauma."
Black girls are six times more likely to be suspended from school than white girls and are criminalized more than other girls, according to a report released earlier this year by the African American Policy Forum, a New York-based think tank. According to her classmates, the Spring Valley High School student assaulted by Fields is said to have momentarily taken out her cell phone during class. When she would not comply with the teacher’s request to hand it over, the principal was then called, and then the school resource officer—Fields.
"When we talk about how our tax-payers dollars are spent to support students’ success, I think policing should not be on the top of that list," said Smith.
i have all positive thought as to the content i think this is something more for individual thought and collective action change is brought about by one sides indifference which defaults in favor of the other or by collective voice in unison and those ears hearing actually hearing and listening not just hearing and walking away no more then they came..
we don't need another all minds matter retort because that too is not true this dynamic and that of those minds bigot's warp and pass through generations if they cared they would not condemn their kids to a life of hate especially now that it's obvious that things are changing despite their laughing at Pres. for saying it and defying all efforts to achieve it now it's who get the last laugh laughs best.
