X.-1 20-1335 Adoption by the Board of Education of Resolution No. 1920-0260 - George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate the Oakland Schools Police Department
You must take police out of our schools! Police make situations more unsafe and do not put our black and brown students first. End this and put more resources into counselors, nurses and other support staff.
As a public school mental health provider, I strongly believe that having police in schools is detrimental to students' mental health and wellbeing. Students need to feel supported and safe at school so they have the capacity to focus on their education. Over and over we have seen and heard about students specifically black students targeted and harassed by police at school, which interferes with not only their learning but their overall wellbeing. It is crucial that police are not on campus for the wellbeing of the whole campus community.
This resolution is years and years overdue and needs to be adopted immediately. The police have no place in public schools much less terrorizing black communities and communities of color. This is a NECESSARY first step in a line of many things we need to change about our system of society as a whole. Reinvest all that d*mn money in supporting your public school teachers, facilities, materials, after school programs, educational support services, restorative justice programs. It's that simple. Stop supporting the school-to-prison pipeline that is killing black people. Stop supporting the channeling of money that is funneled from your districts into weaponzing black and brown skin. Adopt this resolution and LISTEN to the black leaders in the districts you are supposed to be representing and actually DO something. Listen listen listen, you have a responsibility.
It is essential that we remove the OPD from oakland schools, and instead replace police infrastructure with more teaching/counseling/community resources
I am a resident of Oakland and have worked in education for years (at an EdTech company, a curriculum nonprofit, and in student services at a university). In these positions, and in my years as a student, I have never felt the need for police to be in schools. Having armed officers in schools can often intimidate students and rarely adds any benefit. There are ways of making schools safe that are better than having police in them. Additionally, many cops have racist tendencies (this has been revealed in various investigative journalist pieces such as: www.injusticewatch.org/interactives/cops-troubling-facebook-posts-revealed and www.citylab.com/equity/2019/07/police-social-media-facebook-racism-islamophobia-bias/593131 and www.cbsnews.com/video/cops-across-the-country-flagged-for-racist-social-media-posts ). Many students simply do not feel safe around police. I support the bill to eliminate police from Oakland schools. Thank you for your consideration.
I am strongly in support of BOP's George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate the Oakland Schools Police Department. $6 million does NOT need to be spent on police who scare and traumatize children, particularly preying on black students and students of color. Students need counselors and community support. NOT police. Black Organizing Project has already done the hard and important work to make a plan to get police out of schools, please follow their lead and adopt this resolution. Not once have a heard a student speak about police making them feel safe on campus or enhancing their learning. I have heard countless stories of students of color feeling trauma, fear, and even choosing not to attend school because the police are present. Teachers, librarians, principals and many OUSD staff support this resolution. Do the right thing for students and get OPD out of OUSD.
I demand that the OUSD eliminates the Oakland Schools Police Department. OUSD spends $6.5 million on policing and surveilling Oakland students. Not only does this decision preemptively treat minors as criminals, building a space of terror and trauma rather than learning, but it facilitates a racially biased system that disproportionately incarcerates Black and Brown. From 2016 to 2017, 3 out of 4 arrests were of Black students. The money going to the relationship between OUSD and the police is money that instead should be spent on counselors, therapists, librarians, after school programs, and safety efforts rooted in the community and restorative justice. That is where real safety comes from, not from the police.
Right now is a time for change and for building a system with our Black and Brown community at heart. Get the police out of OUSD now.
I am unable to log into the zoom meeting on this agenda item because the conference room is at capacity, so I am writing to log my support of the George Floyd Resolution, noting only that when the Board adopts this legislation it will be lagging behind not only its national equivalents in Minneapolis, Portland, and Denver but also its peers across Alameda county and much of the East Bay. -Rumur Dowling
I strongly support the adoption of this resolution. I believe that all CHILDREN deserve the right to feel safe and supported in schools by folks that are trained to do so. This does not include the Oakland Police.
Please invest in professionals who have the best interest of students and who are trained in the safety of everyone, without violence.
I fully support the elimination of police from OUSD. Law enforcement do not belong in schools. Their presence places black and brown students at risk and makes schools a place of fear, not safety, sanctuary, and learning. I hope Oakland will act as leaders in taking this action. Let's invest in teachers, trauma-informed support for students, and all the other things we KNOW support a healthy learning environment. Please act today!
I am a LMFT with over 20 years working with youth in the Bay Area. I have observed the way that the police treat BIPOC youth. I have watched my clients get caught up in the school to prison pipeline.
If you are a youth who comes from a community that has been traumatized by the police, your body reacts to the perceived danger with a fight, flight or freeze response. In this state, you do not have access to the cognitive part of our brains. This is the part needed to learn. This puts already disadvantaged youth at a greater disadvantage. Scared people are more aggressive.
Mental health professionals, restorative justice are relational and sustainable solutions. With the $6 million dollars that you spend on the OSPD, you could fund more counselors, more services, more teachers, infinite programs that would be much more beneficial for our students. Prevention is more cost effective and effective in multiple other ways for our students, our schools, and our communities.
I am an Oakland resident, and I'm writing to express my full support for the George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate the Oakland School Police Department. Oakland students do not need police in their schools. They don't keep students safe. They only traumatize and brutalize students, and waste valuable resources that should go to psychologists, special education staff, and college counselors. Schools should be sanctuaries, not pipelines to prisons. Thank you.
I support eliminating oakland schools police department and using these funds to increase counseling services, peace ambassadors, teachers. Please vote to pass this resolution
For the good of our youth, especially Black youth, the police must be removed from our schools. Black students matter. We can get better outcomes through counseling and restorative justice programs. Please reallocate the $6 million spent on policing – which adds nothing positive to the educational experience – towards these other programs that could have a huge positive impact on students.
Strong support. It is morally imperative that the Board adopt this Resolution immediately. What further evidence do you need?
Protect our children, cancel the contract with the police, and stop trying to gut our public goods. Leave on a morally correct page, Jody. Or else there's something seriously twisted with you.
What black and brown communities have been saying for a long time, and what I am echoing, is that the presence police in schools does not strengthen the safety of our students, but rather puts many at higher risk in terms of endangering physical safety, emotional safety, and their ability to thrive in their education.
I support the elimination of the OUSD school police. Please redirect ALL funds that currently go to school police into Restorative Justice, Social Workers, and Counselors.
The dangers of the prison-to-school pipeline are well documented. As a district that claims to supports the philosophy and practice of restorative, we must be willing to invest in alternatives to police, and punitive systems of accountability. Please invest in support services for our young people that do not increase their proximity to systems of incarceration.
You must take police out of our schools! Police make situations more unsafe and do not put our black and brown students first. End this and put more resources into counselors, nurses and other support staff.
There have to be better ways to keep discipline in schools! Children should not be part of a school to prison dynamic that now exists!!
As a public school mental health provider, I strongly believe that having police in schools is detrimental to students' mental health and wellbeing. Students need to feel supported and safe at school so they have the capacity to focus on their education. Over and over we have seen and heard about students specifically black students targeted and harassed by police at school, which interferes with not only their learning but their overall wellbeing. It is crucial that police are not on campus for the wellbeing of the whole campus community.
This resolution is years and years overdue and needs to be adopted immediately. The police have no place in public schools much less terrorizing black communities and communities of color. This is a NECESSARY first step in a line of many things we need to change about our system of society as a whole. Reinvest all that d*mn money in supporting your public school teachers, facilities, materials, after school programs, educational support services, restorative justice programs. It's that simple. Stop supporting the school-to-prison pipeline that is killing black people. Stop supporting the channeling of money that is funneled from your districts into weaponzing black and brown skin. Adopt this resolution and LISTEN to the black leaders in the districts you are supposed to be representing and actually DO something. Listen listen listen, you have a responsibility.
It is essential that we remove the OPD from oakland schools, and instead replace police infrastructure with more teaching/counseling/community resources
I am a resident of Oakland and have worked in education for years (at an EdTech company, a curriculum nonprofit, and in student services at a university). In these positions, and in my years as a student, I have never felt the need for police to be in schools. Having armed officers in schools can often intimidate students and rarely adds any benefit. There are ways of making schools safe that are better than having police in them. Additionally, many cops have racist tendencies (this has been revealed in various investigative journalist pieces such as: www.injusticewatch.org/interactives/cops-troubling-facebook-posts-revealed and www.citylab.com/equity/2019/07/police-social-media-facebook-racism-islamophobia-bias/593131 and www.cbsnews.com/video/cops-across-the-country-flagged-for-racist-social-media-posts ). Many students simply do not feel safe around police. I support the bill to eliminate police from Oakland schools. Thank you for your consideration.
I am strongly in support of BOP's George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate the Oakland Schools Police Department. $6 million does NOT need to be spent on police who scare and traumatize children, particularly preying on black students and students of color. Students need counselors and community support. NOT police. Black Organizing Project has already done the hard and important work to make a plan to get police out of schools, please follow their lead and adopt this resolution. Not once have a heard a student speak about police making them feel safe on campus or enhancing their learning. I have heard countless stories of students of color feeling trauma, fear, and even choosing not to attend school because the police are present. Teachers, librarians, principals and many OUSD staff support this resolution. Do the right thing for students and get OPD out of OUSD.
Defund the Police! Black Lives Matter!
I demand that the OUSD eliminates the Oakland Schools Police Department. OUSD spends $6.5 million on policing and surveilling Oakland students. Not only does this decision preemptively treat minors as criminals, building a space of terror and trauma rather than learning, but it facilitates a racially biased system that disproportionately incarcerates Black and Brown. From 2016 to 2017, 3 out of 4 arrests were of Black students. The money going to the relationship between OUSD and the police is money that instead should be spent on counselors, therapists, librarians, after school programs, and safety efforts rooted in the community and restorative justice. That is where real safety comes from, not from the police.
Right now is a time for change and for building a system with our Black and Brown community at heart. Get the police out of OUSD now.
I am unable to log into the zoom meeting on this agenda item because the conference room is at capacity, so I am writing to log my support of the George Floyd Resolution, noting only that when the Board adopts this legislation it will be lagging behind not only its national equivalents in Minneapolis, Portland, and Denver but also its peers across Alameda county and much of the East Bay. -Rumur Dowling
I strongly support the adoption of this resolution. I believe that all CHILDREN deserve the right to feel safe and supported in schools by folks that are trained to do so. This does not include the Oakland Police.
Please invest in professionals who have the best interest of students and who are trained in the safety of everyone, without violence.
Thank you kindly,
I fully support the elimination of police from OUSD. Law enforcement do not belong in schools. Their presence places black and brown students at risk and makes schools a place of fear, not safety, sanctuary, and learning. I hope Oakland will act as leaders in taking this action. Let's invest in teachers, trauma-informed support for students, and all the other things we KNOW support a healthy learning environment. Please act today!
I am a LMFT with over 20 years working with youth in the Bay Area. I have observed the way that the police treat BIPOC youth. I have watched my clients get caught up in the school to prison pipeline.
If you are a youth who comes from a community that has been traumatized by the police, your body reacts to the perceived danger with a fight, flight or freeze response. In this state, you do not have access to the cognitive part of our brains. This is the part needed to learn. This puts already disadvantaged youth at a greater disadvantage. Scared people are more aggressive.
Mental health professionals, restorative justice are relational and sustainable solutions. With the $6 million dollars that you spend on the OSPD, you could fund more counselors, more services, more teachers, infinite programs that would be much more beneficial for our students. Prevention is more cost effective and effective in multiple other ways for our students, our schools, and our communities.
I am an Oakland resident, and I'm writing to express my full support for the George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate the Oakland School Police Department. Oakland students do not need police in their schools. They don't keep students safe. They only traumatize and brutalize students, and waste valuable resources that should go to psychologists, special education staff, and college counselors. Schools should be sanctuaries, not pipelines to prisons. Thank you.
I support eliminating oakland schools police department and using these funds to increase counseling services, peace ambassadors, teachers. Please vote to pass this resolution
For the good of our youth, especially Black youth, the police must be removed from our schools. Black students matter. We can get better outcomes through counseling and restorative justice programs. Please reallocate the $6 million spent on policing – which adds nothing positive to the educational experience – towards these other programs that could have a huge positive impact on students.
Strong support. It is morally imperative that the Board adopt this Resolution immediately. What further evidence do you need?
Protect our children, cancel the contract with the police, and stop trying to gut our public goods. Leave on a morally correct page, Jody. Or else there's something seriously twisted with you.
What black and brown communities have been saying for a long time, and what I am echoing, is that the presence police in schools does not strengthen the safety of our students, but rather puts many at higher risk in terms of endangering physical safety, emotional safety, and their ability to thrive in their education.
I support the elimination of the OUSD school police. Please redirect ALL funds that currently go to school police into Restorative Justice, Social Workers, and Counselors.
The dangers of the prison-to-school pipeline are well documented. As a district that claims to supports the philosophy and practice of restorative, we must be willing to invest in alternatives to police, and punitive systems of accountability. Please invest in support services for our young people that do not increase their proximity to systems of incarceration.