I.-1 20-1335 Adoption by the Board of Education of Resolution No. 1920-0260 - George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate the Oakland Schools Police Department.
Our children do not need police in their schools. Their safety does not include police officers. I urge OSUD to adopt the George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate the Oakland Schools Police Department.
Hello members of the board, I am writing today in support of the BOP’s initiative to eliminate Oakland School Districts Police Department. As someone who works with youth enrichment programs weekly, I consistently hear that students feel school police forces in any capacity do not offer them any sort of peace of mind, but rather the opposite. By having a police force imbedded in your schools, you create a hostile environment in which students can be taken to jail for a simple act of “disobedience”. By having this police force, you are arming teachers with the nuclear option. Instead of taking the time to try and understand the students problems, you simply throw the book at them and expect them to find there own way. This is SICK. Stop sacrificing your own kids to the overcrowded and corrupt judicial system and instead invest in the kids themselves. It is time to cut the school to prison pipeline that has ruined the lives of countless children, and that time is TODAY!!
Strong support. It is money far better spent investing in serving our students, not policing. In my 15 years in OUSD I have countless stories about our black and brown students calling OSPD to serve them and instead being treated as they themselves are criminals. It seems the department is incapable of seeing black and brown youth as victims. It is a system beyond reform, and we should not spend another cent on it.
As a mental health professional working in the OUSD schools I support the removal of the police from our schools. Police presence has historically harmed students especially in moments of mental health break downs and in reporting sexual assaults. I do not believe that police presence does anything to keep our students safe but rather causes greater harm and trauma to already traumatized population. OUSD's money would be much better spent on increased mental health and other community supports.
I am a parent who lives in District 1 and has a child at Melrose Leadership Academy. I stand in absolute solidarity with the Black Organizing Project and their call for Police-Free Schools. They never should have been there in the first place, and it is LONG overdue to get them out. Kids need more counselors, mental health services, and restorative justice programs, not punitive policing. I am asking you Jody London, as my neighbor, as Board President, and someone with white privilege, to truly LISTEN to the black and brown students and their parents, and take the lead of the Black Organizing Project. Vote “Yes” on the George Floyd Resolution for Police Free Schools as written, with NO amendments or revisions, no “hybrid” model and with a community driven process which does NOT include police at the table. Please stand on the right side of history and help usher in a new day at OUSD. - Kristi Laughlin, parent of a 5th grader
I am a mental health clinician specializing in adolescent trauma. I see the impact of the trauma of police in communities everyday. This is only perpetuated this trauma by having police in schools. You must vote now for the George Floyd resolution to get police out of schools right now. This should have been done long ago and now is the time! The community has spoken as has the nation and the world! Be on the right side of history.
Eliminate the OPD from our district and increase funding and support and and enrichment services for our students! Increase funding for school counselors, art programs, music programs, language programs, school nurses, family services, after-school programing, nutrition, tutors...the list goes on! OPD does none of these things and has no place in our schools. Every student needs to know that their school is invested in them and that Black Lives Matter! End the school to prison pipeline. Board members this is your chance to make a change in the criminalization of youth! Eliminate OPD and vote YES!!!!
I am an Oakland resident and community member. I am deeply moved by the efforts of students of color in OUSD to organize around removing police presence from their schools. As Oakland grapples with budget challenges in the era of COVID shouldn't education resources go toward education and student support, not suppression and fear? Research is showing how disproportionately students of color are impacted by law enforcement in schools and students themselves are begging for solutions that are generative and not punitive. Please honor all students and members of the Oakland community and vote YES on The George Floyd Resolution. Oakland can be a leader in equity in education!
As an administrator of 6 OUSD health clinics, I ask you to consider the generational trauma imposed on our black youth as you come to a decision. There is endless research on the School-to-Prison Pipeline and Adolescent Childhood Experiences, and their life-long detrimental effects. Police presence in schools reinforces generational and systemic oppression. I compel you to hold compassion in your heart as you look past superficial-fear that might be instilled in you, and feel the pain that we, as a system, have instilled in our youth, by allowing a system that we can take advantage of, take advantage of them. I urge you to pass the George Floyd resolution as is, with no amendments. If ANY resolution is to occur, I stand with my community in the decision to distribute funds and attention to programs and tools that can empower and protect our youth.
Get rid of them ASAP. Spend your time on improving skills in elementary school. How are you focused on policing students but not on making sure ALL students can read coming out of 5th grade? Yes you have many students who cannot read in elementary school who make it to middle school!
Why is that? Numerous reasons; you’re all focused on photo shoots at schools in the hills rather than coming down to East Oakland and being active in our schools. Are you afraid of the children? Maybe that’s the reason you feel the need to police them as opposed to actually ensuring a proper education for them.
Another reason, you do nothing to stimulate community outreach in lower socioeconomic areas of Oakland. Many parents would do wonders know that having their kids read 40min a night makes a difference or working in fact fluency for 15-20min a day will boost their skills.
If you’re unable or unwilling to do the job properly, please step aside. This isn’t about your pride, it’s about kids
I am a resident of District 5 and work in District 4. I fully support the Black Organizing Project George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate Oakland Schools police department. Student need to be free from fear to learn. How can they learn if there are police officers watching over them. Trust families, build community, get children the resources they need to thrive. Invest in community. Thank you to the BOP.
I am the Associate Medical Director for La Clinica's School Based Health Centers and have been working in OUSD schools, serving the medical needs of K-12 students, for the last 10 years. During this time I have witnessed interactions between the police and students that are insensitive at best and traumatizing at worst. Students of color, particularly Black students, are disproportionately harmed by OUSD's practice of policing rather than supporting students. We can and must do better for our young people and we know how to do this work. Stop funding police presence in schools and reinvest in educators and mental health professionals who have the appropriate training to provide trauma informed prevention, intervention, and crisis management.
I urge OSUD to adopt the George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate the Oakland Schools Police Department. Oakland students deserve to be safe and this can only happen without a policy presence in their schools.
Deleted User
over 4 years ago
I am an Oakland resident and educator in District 4 and I whole-heartedly support the Black Organizing Project's George Floyd Resolution, to remove police from Oakland Schools. Removal of police from schools is just one of many ways we can work to ensure the success and support of our black students in Oakland.
The community is behind this! Thank you BOP for putting in the work. A 'yes' vote is a no brainer here. Let's go OUSD and make this a first step in the long process to get our school and city moving to be anti-racist.
Oakland Students in the FLY Program - “I feel as though police officers on campuses cause more fear. School safety means a lot to me being a student who has gone to different schools and needing to feel safe where I get my education. Police on campus make me feel uncomfortable being at school, especially for people of color because we are paid close attention to. I feel things that schools could do to provide a positive environment for youths’ learning is bringing more counselors, mental health workers, and more youth groups. There needs to be more people for youth to talk to who can help redirect situations that do not need to be escalated by police presence.”-Student 1
“I’m not saying that all police are bad. They need to be better trained...Having programs like FLY on campus, could make things better. Maybe kids need to be talked to before getting in trouble. It might be better for students and families.”- Student 2
“School police really aren’t there to protect us.” - Student 3
I really hope I can celebrate the school board as heroes for voting yes on the George Floyd resolution (with no amendments or delays). The time is NOW to take bold action and re-envision what safety can look like- for all of our students!!!
I am an Oakland resident who stands with the Black Organizing Project and countless others in the community urging you to pass the George Floyd Resolution and take police out of OUSD schools. Our schools must be a space for Black and brown children to feel safe and not at risk of being terrorized by police. Districts across the nation are taking this important step and I hope that OUSD can do the same.
Our children do not need police in their schools. Their safety does not include police officers. I urge OSUD to adopt the George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate the Oakland Schools Police Department.
Hello members of the board, I am writing today in support of the BOP’s initiative to eliminate Oakland School Districts Police Department. As someone who works with youth enrichment programs weekly, I consistently hear that students feel school police forces in any capacity do not offer them any sort of peace of mind, but rather the opposite. By having a police force imbedded in your schools, you create a hostile environment in which students can be taken to jail for a simple act of “disobedience”. By having this police force, you are arming teachers with the nuclear option. Instead of taking the time to try and understand the students problems, you simply throw the book at them and expect them to find there own way. This is SICK. Stop sacrificing your own kids to the overcrowded and corrupt judicial system and instead invest in the kids themselves. It is time to cut the school to prison pipeline that has ruined the lives of countless children, and that time is TODAY!!
Strong support. It is money far better spent investing in serving our students, not policing. In my 15 years in OUSD I have countless stories about our black and brown students calling OSPD to serve them and instead being treated as they themselves are criminals. It seems the department is incapable of seeing black and brown youth as victims. It is a system beyond reform, and we should not spend another cent on it.
As a mental health professional working in the OUSD schools I support the removal of the police from our schools. Police presence has historically harmed students especially in moments of mental health break downs and in reporting sexual assaults. I do not believe that police presence does anything to keep our students safe but rather causes greater harm and trauma to already traumatized population. OUSD's money would be much better spent on increased mental health and other community supports.
I am a parent who lives in District 1 and has a child at Melrose Leadership Academy. I stand in absolute solidarity with the Black Organizing Project and their call for Police-Free Schools. They never should have been there in the first place, and it is LONG overdue to get them out. Kids need more counselors, mental health services, and restorative justice programs, not punitive policing. I am asking you Jody London, as my neighbor, as Board President, and someone with white privilege, to truly LISTEN to the black and brown students and their parents, and take the lead of the Black Organizing Project. Vote “Yes” on the George Floyd Resolution for Police Free Schools as written, with NO amendments or revisions, no “hybrid” model and with a community driven process which does NOT include police at the table. Please stand on the right side of history and help usher in a new day at OUSD. - Kristi Laughlin, parent of a 5th grader
I am a mental health clinician specializing in adolescent trauma. I see the impact of the trauma of police in communities everyday. This is only perpetuated this trauma by having police in schools. You must vote now for the George Floyd resolution to get police out of schools right now. This should have been done long ago and now is the time! The community has spoken as has the nation and the world! Be on the right side of history.
I fully support removing OPD from Oakland schools
Eliminate the OPD from our district and increase funding and support and and enrichment services for our students! Increase funding for school counselors, art programs, music programs, language programs, school nurses, family services, after-school programing, nutrition, tutors...the list goes on! OPD does none of these things and has no place in our schools. Every student needs to know that their school is invested in them and that Black Lives Matter! End the school to prison pipeline. Board members this is your chance to make a change in the criminalization of youth! Eliminate OPD and vote YES!!!!
I am an Oakland resident and community member. I am deeply moved by the efforts of students of color in OUSD to organize around removing police presence from their schools. As Oakland grapples with budget challenges in the era of COVID shouldn't education resources go toward education and student support, not suppression and fear? Research is showing how disproportionately students of color are impacted by law enforcement in schools and students themselves are begging for solutions that are generative and not punitive. Please honor all students and members of the Oakland community and vote YES on The George Floyd Resolution. Oakland can be a leader in equity in education!
Appropriate skills for appropriate problems.
As an administrator of 6 OUSD health clinics, I ask you to consider the generational trauma imposed on our black youth as you come to a decision. There is endless research on the School-to-Prison Pipeline and Adolescent Childhood Experiences, and their life-long detrimental effects. Police presence in schools reinforces generational and systemic oppression. I compel you to hold compassion in your heart as you look past superficial-fear that might be instilled in you, and feel the pain that we, as a system, have instilled in our youth, by allowing a system that we can take advantage of, take advantage of them. I urge you to pass the George Floyd resolution as is, with no amendments. If ANY resolution is to occur, I stand with my community in the decision to distribute funds and attention to programs and tools that can empower and protect our youth.
Get rid of them ASAP. Spend your time on improving skills in elementary school. How are you focused on policing students but not on making sure ALL students can read coming out of 5th grade? Yes you have many students who cannot read in elementary school who make it to middle school!
Why is that? Numerous reasons; you’re all focused on photo shoots at schools in the hills rather than coming down to East Oakland and being active in our schools. Are you afraid of the children? Maybe that’s the reason you feel the need to police them as opposed to actually ensuring a proper education for them.
Another reason, you do nothing to stimulate community outreach in lower socioeconomic areas of Oakland. Many parents would do wonders know that having their kids read 40min a night makes a difference or working in fact fluency for 15-20min a day will boost their skills.
If you’re unable or unwilling to do the job properly, please step aside. This isn’t about your pride, it’s about kids
I am a resident of District 5 and work in District 4. I fully support the Black Organizing Project George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate Oakland Schools police department. Student need to be free from fear to learn. How can they learn if there are police officers watching over them. Trust families, build community, get children the resources they need to thrive. Invest in community. Thank you to the BOP.
I am the Associate Medical Director for La Clinica's School Based Health Centers and have been working in OUSD schools, serving the medical needs of K-12 students, for the last 10 years. During this time I have witnessed interactions between the police and students that are insensitive at best and traumatizing at worst. Students of color, particularly Black students, are disproportionately harmed by OUSD's practice of policing rather than supporting students. We can and must do better for our young people and we know how to do this work. Stop funding police presence in schools and reinvest in educators and mental health professionals who have the appropriate training to provide trauma informed prevention, intervention, and crisis management.
I urge OSUD to adopt the George Floyd Resolution to Eliminate the Oakland Schools Police Department. Oakland students deserve to be safe and this can only happen without a policy presence in their schools.
I am an Oakland resident and educator in District 4 and I whole-heartedly support the Black Organizing Project's George Floyd Resolution, to remove police from Oakland Schools. Removal of police from schools is just one of many ways we can work to ensure the success and support of our black students in Oakland.
The community is behind this! Thank you BOP for putting in the work. A 'yes' vote is a no brainer here. Let's go OUSD and make this a first step in the long process to get our school and city moving to be anti-racist.
Oakland Students in the FLY Program - “I feel as though police officers on campuses cause more fear. School safety means a lot to me being a student who has gone to different schools and needing to feel safe where I get my education. Police on campus make me feel uncomfortable being at school, especially for people of color because we are paid close attention to. I feel things that schools could do to provide a positive environment for youths’ learning is bringing more counselors, mental health workers, and more youth groups. There needs to be more people for youth to talk to who can help redirect situations that do not need to be escalated by police presence.”-Student 1
“I’m not saying that all police are bad. They need to be better trained...Having programs like FLY on campus, could make things better. Maybe kids need to be talked to before getting in trouble. It might be better for students and families.”- Student 2
“School police really aren’t there to protect us.” - Student 3
I really hope I can celebrate the school board as heroes for voting yes on the George Floyd resolution (with no amendments or delays). The time is NOW to take bold action and re-envision what safety can look like- for all of our students!!!
I am an Oakland resident who stands with the Black Organizing Project and countless others in the community urging you to pass the George Floyd Resolution and take police out of OUSD schools. Our schools must be a space for Black and brown children to feel safe and not at risk of being terrorized by police. Districts across the nation are taking this important step and I hope that OUSD can do the same.