Over the last two years I wrote some posts about how school discipline has been getting worse since Mayor, Bill de Blasio took office who sees the New York City Public Schools from the perspective of his high achieving children who went to specialized high schools. You can find my posts Here, Here, and Here.
First, it was the ill-advised cellphone policy that allowed students to carry them in school. Sure, he insisted that the students could not use in in the classroom but he put the responsibility squarely on the teacher, School administrators held the teachers accountable and not their own lack of enforcement for the cellphone use in the school. The result was that students were distracted and a study showed that it caused a reduction in student academic achievement, especially in poor, minority schools.
Second, the Mayor allowed a lax student discipline policy with fewer suspensions and schools could no longer suspend a student unless DOE Central approved it. Instead he pushed a restorative justice program and for more serious offenses a "warning card" program. The result was a more unsafe school environment as misbehaving and even dangerous students were sent back to the classroom to continue to terrorize the teacher and students.
Finally, under Mayor Bill de Blasio's progressive policy, his emphasis to reduce arrests and suspensions in the schools allowed students to run roughshod in the schools with little fear of punishment.
The Bill de Blasio approach to school discipline is just like the "broken window theory" just like real broken windows if the windows remain unfixed in houses on the block, eventually the rest of the houses on the block will experience lower property values, and have broken windows themselves. The same goes for the schools if the misbehaving and violent students are not punished and they continue to disrupt and disrespect the classroom, eventually other students will follow suit. The result is an academically deteriorating school.
Max Eden of the Manhattan Institute did a detailed analysis of the Bill de Blasio student discipline policies and came up with the same conclusions as I have written about since the Mayor took office. You can find the full report Here. A summary of the report by Chalkbeat can be found Here.
