IndexSummaryIntroductionProblem ScopePre-existing Policies and ProceduresSuspension and Effects on AdulthoodConclusionPolicy RecommendationsReferencesSummaryThere continues to be great concern about how the school-to-prison pipeline is addressed. While statistics may suggest that juvenile incarceration rates may be decreasing and that the severity of kids ending up in the juvenile justice system due to criminal activity is also declining, there is still a looming concern about how they will continue to end up there. Prison systems are one problem, but how you treat people and respond to their behavior is another. As it stands, the correlation may not seem that great, but this inverse relationship may suggest that policies are pushing children out of school, which makes them targets of the system it suggests they won't be a part of. The problem is that the policy and procedure given to teenagers is what affects them directly rather than indirectly and how they respond makes them the perfect candidates for an issue that creates a much broader connection. How they grow up and how they integrate into a society that should make them successful adults. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay As it stands, much of the procedure put in place is aimed at punishing or suspending children based on the severity of how they behave or the actions they take to be involved. Because of this, school systems become dependent on the use of a single disciplinary method such as suspensions and creates a dilemma moving forward on how to deal with a problem child. As we become dependent on one method, the result is suspension rates that continue to increase, target specific minority groups, and diminish the trust and relationship a student can have with their school administration. If we add to this the educational delay and the fact that late adolescents come into contact with the youth systems first hand, we arrive with the utmost certainty that schools are pushing these children out causing them to a certain extent to fail. Policy and procedure must change to suit our young people, for example through extensive reform in how we address them. Some recommendations include counseling, restorative justice programs, implementation of positive behavior support systems, limits on law enforcement, and many others. IntroductionOne of the main focal points towards the correlation between the school and prison systems is the majority of racial disparity that exists between certain groups. . What has been true for most of the criminal justice system is also true for the school-to-prison pipeline debate where African Americans have felt the transition between getting an education and being incarcerated. In 2000, “African Americans represented only 17 percent of public school enrollment in this period, but accounted for an excessive 34 percent of suspensions (survey).” This is in contrast to their White counterparts who may exhibit similar types of behavioral misconduct and are less likely to be suspended, expelled, or arrested (Skiba 2000). What becomes particularly clear is the association between policing and its use within schools. This phenomenon is relatively new when resource officers or law enforcement officers only constituted less than “one hundred officers in the late 1970s in public schools (Hirschfield and Celinska).” THEnumbers have gradually increased over time, and due to their excessive use, the overall cost has also increased. School resource officers earn over $619 million per year assuming over 19,000 are employed full time and the number is astronomically more expensive than if you employed them in every public school nationwide (James & McCallion). The same amount of money that can be applied to other programs will dismantle the system that targets such individuals by setting them up for unsuccessful lives. There are several approaches that can be taken to reduce the impact and they need to be analyzed in more depth. Approaches such as the use of punishment, counseling, social services, and the types of policies and procedures that have been implemented up to this point. Because of the way the education system fails to address students, we need to approach them with more patience than short-term solutions because what is increasingly becoming a fact is that Black students and students with disabilities have greater less likely to be severely punished for subjective disciplinary offenses than White students and for this reason, other methods should be practiced to encourage students to succeed in school instead of using punishment. Problem Scope Much of the problem that comes with connecting channels is the methods used to understand the behavior. The problem lies in how law enforcement establishes punishment without a crime actually being committed. When this relationship is established, it is most often instilled in minors because the priority is placed on the assumption that punishment should be the source for establishing greater influence in a teenager's life than education. This creates a force between two opposing forces trying to establish better involvement in the child's life. One is the way police are used in schools and the other is the use of proper education. The primary goal of punishment as beneficial was to enable “the removal of problem students from schools and use incapacitation and deterrence to reduce misbehavior and improve school safety (Hirschfield and Celinska 2011; Mears et al. 2018 ).” Consequently, in doing so it was not done in such a way as to favor all students who acted with incorrect behavioral tendencies. What resulted was that a large disparity was created among students who were targeted more frequently than others. When identifying punishment, it is mostly used in examples that include detentions, suspensions, or a combination of both. As detentions decreased suspensions, rates increased, and “black or minority racially targeted students were three times more likely to be suspended or expelled than white students (Nelson 2015). Impacts that led students to fail a year or abandon their studies altogether. Discipline has not been handled by the efforts of the school administration and is instead in the hands of law enforcement who do not have adequate training to address these issues. Applying a punishment that is usually much harsher the second time than the first and if the same people are targeted, those are the same people who end up getting arrested. This ends up creating additional unnecessary work for both parties involved because it fuels incarceration rates and also discourages student development. When it came to individuals who suffered from disabilities, they were also disproportionately represented. Approximately “8.6% were identified as having onesort of disability that affected their ability to learn and these students made up 32% of young people in detention centers (Elias 2013).” The racial differences are evident because removing them from an environment that should stimulate them, such as school, increases the chances that they will drop out because they never establish some sort of foundation that encourages learning. Instead these individuals not only struggle with their disability, but also become more vulnerable to the criminal justice system because there is no encouragement to want to learn. Pre-Existing Policies and Procedures The intended effect of these increases in incarceration rates comes down to the policy that has been put in place to live with it. It involves the brief history of the use of zero tolerance policies and the impact they have. Zero tolerance is defined as “disciplinary policies that impose fixed punishments for specific offenses (Jackson 2019)”. THE problem with policies like this is that they create a strong avenue for people to be targeted for minor crimes. Instead of creating appropriate measures to discipline young people based on their behavior, you instead create a way to use that behavior as a means to act inappropriately. Once this is done, it can be used as a means to suspend or, in extreme cases, expel students on the premise of having behavioral problems. Instead of seeking other methods such as counseling, you discourage the acting out method by creating an environment where others do not act that way. It could have a negative impact on those people because they would be less likely to seek help when they themselves are going through something similar. It effectively locks people inside. Law enforcement made “an estimated 2.2 million arrests of people under the age of 18 in 2003 (Sydney 2005).” According to the Violent Crime Index, “child abuse arrests in 2003 were the lowest since 1987 (Snyder 2005).” This suggests that the number has decreased due to the implementation of zero tolerance policies. Instead of addressing issues that would benefit young people, you arrest them for it and get rid of the problem altogether while ignoring the significant benefits of helping them. Thanks to this policy in particular it is possible to define the relationship between school and prison by specifically discussing the most significant incarceration rates. In California, “African American males represent 28.5% of the state's male prison population, despite Black men making up only 6.6% of the state's adult males (Skinner 2019).” It is alarming because it is also stated that “students suspended for at least 10 days are less likely to graduate and more likely to be arrested in their mid-20s (Skinner 2019).” Its meaning comes from how direct the relationship appears to be. Arguing that “overcriminalization results in experiences in school where African American males are reported for punishment when nothing has happened (Commentaries 2019).” This suggests that once zero tolerance policies are no longer in place, anything else can be used as a way to flag an individual. For example, “intentional defiance is a suspended category in which a large percentage of students who fall into this category are Black (Skinner 2019).” This challenge usually involves something minor like refusing to take off a certain accessory, refusing to take off a hat, or interrupting class with lashing behavior. While removing an individual from context may benefit the class as a whole, it often has the opposite effect for the excluded individual and instead isolates them. Instead of practicing this procedure, you should use some type of positive reinforcement forimprove behavior by first explaining student expectations. Suspension and Effects on Adulthood When it comes to suspensions there is a broad association with the juvenile justice system. It involves a student's life expectancy and how it impacts their future life. The direct report in question specifies that at least “young people who experience at least one suspension report lower academic commitment than those who did not receive a suspension (Raffaele Mendez 2003)”. When they have a history associated with suspensions, they also suffer the same fate by not striving for academic success. This affects the peers that teens associate with and further adds to riskier activities that land them in compromising positions. If behavior were central to this, then you would develop socially different. Antisocial tendencies and more delinquent behavior would adapt better to the environment increasing the chances of incarceration based on decisions you wouldn't normally make. Acting outside the norm becomes fundamental. It also serves to argue that suspensions lead to incarceration rates and that an increase is a likelihood. As an overview aside from suspension, the fact that being suspended leads to life-changing events and this effect is what causes young people to increase their chances of being locked up. Specifically, “school discipline can serve as a tipping point that negatively affects individuals' future outcomes (Mowen & Brent 2016).” Since they are life-altering events, the connection to seeing this early in life can influence your decisions and increase your chances of being arrested. The opposite is also true, when in creating these deterrents one becomes discouraged because life becomes more difficult, as in the case in which a student's family situation is not ideal, or one gives up because nothing changes. With law enforcement now involved in this aspect, the sooner the greater the exposure, the harsher the experience. The experience you are exposed to can cloud the relationship between law enforcement who are meant to protect you and the negative image that may be created. Early contact with the police often “places students on a path of alienation, suspension, expulsion, and arrest (Tobacman 2012).” Because their presence is shown negatively, this creates an atmosphere where students fear officers instead of using them as a resource. The goal should be to implement them as a resource where students feel like they are there to protect them rather than be punished by them. Associations are very important because they create future perceptions, and creating healthier relationships can benefit both officials and students. Conclusion To understand the significant issues plaguing the school-to-prison pipeline, it is necessary to examine the areas that most impact it. More important than anything there must be accountability for how young people are funneled into a system that feeds on their inability to succeed. An analysis of their behaviors is needed and there needs to be a way to address these issues more directly so that the system does not continue to fail them. It must be understood that those most affected by this are black students and students with disabilities who are more likely to be punished severely for minor subjective disciplinary infractions than white students and for this reason other methods are in use to encourage students to have success schooling should be practiced instead of using any form of punishment. Suspension and incarceration rates should also be taken seriously because politics must solve the problems/