From Cell Phones to Jail Cells
The day started off just like any other day. It was the fall of 2006 and I was an eighth grader at Marie Curie Middle School (M.S. 158Q) in Bayside, Queens. As my mother’s car approached the front of the school we noticed an unusually large number of students lined up to enter the school. The line extended beyond the school gates, spilling onto the street and wrapping around the corner. Parked nearby were large police vans, different from the police cars and trucks I was so used to seeing as a New York City native.
Upon seeing the increased police presence, it dawned on me that they were here to set up metal detectors. Earlier in the year, families had received a letter from the school administration informing them of a new “roving metal detector” program being implemented…show more content… Any student found guilty of drug use, gang activity, or fighting was automatically expelled from their respective school (Skiba, 2000). Similar policies had seen widespread adoption across the country by 1993. That following year, President Bill Clinton signed into law, the Gun-Free Schools Act. The act served as a federal mandate that students found guilty on gun offenses be expelled. Schools that did not follow the policy would not given access to federal funding, pressuring schools across the country to abide. The act has since been amended several times to include other weapons outside of guns, expanding the list of potential charges that students could be expelled for (Skiba, 2000). On a local level, these policies have been further expanded to encompass conduct including smoking, fighting, swearing, and drinking. By the year 1997, zero tolerance policies for weapon possession had been implemented by 94% of American schools. Policies for alcohol and tobacco possession had been adopted by 87% and 79% of American schools respectively (Skiba,
