Gun Free School

The No Child Left Behind Act has one obscure provision which requires the identification of schools that are “persistently dangerous schools (PDS).” There are 94,000 schools in the country; only 46 schools have been declared as PDS. Yet, America’s children still feel unsafe.

* At a senior high school in D.C., there were 61 violent offenses. These included 3 sexual assaults, 1 assault with a deadly weapon, and 21 non-violent incidents where security guards caught students bringing knives and guns to school. This school is not classified a PDS.

* A high school in Los Angeles recorded 289 incidents of battery, 2 assaults with a deadly weapon, 1 robbery and 2 sexual assaults — all in one school year, as reported in a US Department of Education audit. Despite these incidents, it is not categorized as a PDS. In fact, not a single school in the 9,000 California schools can qualify as a PDS under the definition established by the state.

* In its 2006 audit of New York high schools, the state comptroller reported that more than one-third of violent and disruptive incidents found in school records were not officially reported to the State Education Department.

The US Department of Education says the underreporting of violent incidents is a practice prevalent in virtually all schools. There are at least two reasons for the refusal to identify a school as a persistently dangerous school.

* School administrators think the PDS label has unpleasant connotations and is detrimental to their professional careers and stigmatizes them as ineffective administrators.

* States do not like the political and economic consequences of having their schools categorized as PDS. There would also be a social aspect to it, as schools become stigmatized by the label.

Critics of the Act say the underreporting indicates the legislation is not working. Lawmakers say they hope the policy guidelines can be modified when the law is scheduled for reauthorization. At that point, Congress can modify the law or abolish it.

The law leaves it up to the States to define what constitutes a PDS. There is wide variation in the definitions, says the US Department of Education, but the department can only offer advice – which is all too often ignored.

A member of the US House of Representatives has introduced a bill that changes the label from PDS to a less threatening description, believing it is the label alone that causes the resistance to implement policy. The congressman said principals and state officials should take the policy seriously and face violence problems squarely. The bottom line is that America’s children are afraid to go to school because of the violence.

Safety Tips:
* If your children’s schools are candidates for PDS categorization, rally around the schools to make them safer. Parents in six Baltimore schools labeled PDS did just that.
* Write your US congressman and senator to express your opinions about the No Child Left Behind Act.