High schools looking at alternatives to more police

by Sheila Simmons

With some 2,500 "serious incidents" reported at Philadelphia public high schools last year and two murders outside school doors this year, policing remains a prime focus of attention for high schools. School safety is also consistently the top-ranking concern expressed by parents.

More police, School District officials admit, is what high school principals most often request to address safety problems.

But others - District officials included - identify different policing strategies and better policing as likely to make the biggest impact on school violence. These approaches are now getting attention in Philadelphia's public high schools.

Different policing approaches, sometimes called "alternative policing," currently exist in the form of a handful of voluntary, community-led efforts - like a clergy-led campaign following a shooting near Germantown High - as well as a District pilot program now underway around three neighborhood high schools that teams with a community anti-violence group.

Pennsylvania legislators, the District's Office of School Climate and Safety, and advocacy groups that have complained about strained relations between students and school police officers are all exploring ways to institute better policing.

More policing

The District police force is already among the largest forces in the state, with 700 officers at its disposal.

Some 450 personnel work as full-functioning, uniformed school police officers. The other 250 are "per diem" officers who receive about half the training and who chiefly assist on safety-related issues. They are currently part of daily staffing in the District's schools.

Each high school is also equipped with a walk-through metal detector, a conveyor-belted x-ray machine that scans book bags and purses, and security cameras that schools can opt to use.

Schools CEO Paul Vallas has also urged the city to submit a proposal for federal funding that would pay for two armed, uniformed city police officers to be stationed full-time at 31 neighborhood high schools.

Philadelphia Mayor John F. Street has squelched the proposal, saying he didn't want schools seen as "armed penitentiaries" and cited the public outrage that was bound to ensue if a police officer actually shot a student in school.

But Vernard Trent, director of the District's Office of School Climate and Safety, stresses that schools should not focus safety responsibilities solely on the police officers in the building.

"If you talk to school principals, there are never enough police," Trent says. "But when we go in and do an analysis of what amount of staff is needed to cover a school, in many cases, they have enough staff. It's the adults in the building overall who contribute to school safety."

Critics of the growing police presence in schools say it inevitably places children in the category of outlaws.

And sometimes, critics charge, bad policing contributes to school climate problems.

According to District Chief Safety Officer Dexter Green, "80 to 85 percent of my people understand the direction we're moving in and are using their talents to do their job."

But Eric Braxton, executive director of the Philadelphia Student Union (PSU), cites student complaints of physical or verbal mistreatment by school police or other staff, including slamming students against lockers, throwing them down stairs "and really injuring people."