guilty, until proven innocent

Adapted from an entry I wrote in my weekly log for a course in the ethics of school administration.

About a month ago, I began my stint as an assistant wrestling coach with an independent school in Manhattan. The process of contacting the coach and getting “hired” was relatively easy. On the first day of practice I showed up and told the person at the front desk I was there to see the coach. She called his office and upon getting no answer, gave me a visitor’s pass and sent me on my way. She had no idea who I was or whether I was telling the truth, but I found myself walking through the hallways of a K-12 school.

This happened several more times before the coach had me take a photo for a school ID. What fascinated me most was the degree of trust in this community. Eventually, because the school decided they would pay me, I had to fill out some forms and sign off on a background check. It’s a good thing I have a clean history, but what would they have done if, one month into my relationship with the school, they found out that I am a convicted child molester? Such is the challenge of allowing adults to enter a school community.

Contrast this with my experience visiting Martin Luther King, Jr. High School as part of class I took. We had to put our bags through a scanner and walk through a metal detector, and a security guard waved his wand all about us. At several other of the public schools we visited, security guards (complete with guns in their holsters) manned the main entrances. I have to wonder what the experience is like for a student attending one of these schools. What is it like having to walk through a metal detector every morning? What is it like walking into school and being viewed as a potential criminal and threat to the school? I imagine that it becomes part of the daily routine for these students but at the same time, certain attitudes become engrained in their minds and habits.

I wonder about adolescents, the psychology of identity, and the fact that for many of us (and certainly for most teenagers), the way other people see us lends us our identities. So if the people around me see me as a potential gun-toting hoodlum, is it possible that I may begin to take on that identity? By effectively institutionalizing innocent youth, do we create a self-fulfilling prophecy in which treating them like criminals will turn them into criminals? These students may cease to see their school as a school. The enjoyment they derive from going to school diminishes and over a period of time, they stop attending school altogether. Now they’re on the streets and who knows what will happen next. Some may claim that I made some grand leaps in my logic, but I would hold pretty firm that there are many places where events unfold exactly as I’ve described them.

At the very least, the safety measures employed at schools are merely precautions. But if the students are being reminded daily about how unsafe their school is, has the school undermined its own efforts to create an environment that is conducive to good learning? Is there an alternative? Can the school justify getting rid of metal detectors and security guards if there does exist a threat to their students? How would the school justify its decision if, after abolishing these security measures, a tragedy involving guns at school occurs?

I would argue that in this case, safety comes first and if there is any real threat to the school, then the school must continue with its practices, as unfortunate as it seems. Dialogue is also important, however. Explain to students that this is one instance in which a school must implement a policy of fairness that involves treating everyone equally. The reality (I hope) is that most of the students are not threats and will never be. Talking with the students, reminding them of their real value in the world, helping them to develop a sense of self-efficacy and agency, offering them real opportunities to learn so that they forget they walked through a set of metal detectors that morning – that is what schools must provide these children.

At the same time, we, as a nation, must think about how to effect change in world outside the school walls. How can we create safer streets and neighborhoods, free of violence, gangs, and drugs? How can we think about crime and why it is so prevalent, particularly in our urban centers, and work to reduce its presence in our cities? These are such big questions, but we have a moral obligation to try to find solutions.