School (in)Security: When School Cops Prey on Students, Gunfire Close to Campus

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Police officers are employed to keep their communities safe. Since the 1960s, “Officer Friendly” has assured children that the police are there to help. 

But a damning new investigation in The Washington Post reveals how cops routinely subject children to sexual abuse, with little accountability. Between 2005 and 2022, reporters identified 1,800 officers across the country who were charged with child sexual abuse. 

The officers routinely spent months grooming kids, documents revealed, and many used the threat of arrest to force compliance. 

Among perpetrators were school resource officers, who “have unparalleled access to children, often with very little supervision.” 

Read The Washington Post story here.

Go deeper: I previously reported on a dataset of misconduct incidents involving school-based cops, including 285 cases where students were injured or killed. 

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In the news

This again? The Los Angeles Unified School District has confirmed that student records were stolen and are for sale on the dark web following a cyberattack on SnowFlake, a cloud service the district and other companies have relied on to store their data. The data breach appears separate from a similar incident at LAUSD that I reported on earlier this month. | Bleeping Computer

More from America’s second-largest district: LAUSD will ban students from using cell phones during the school day beginning next year. It remains unclear how the district plans to enforce the rules, but apparently some schools have begun to require students to keep their phones in “magnetically locked pouches.” | LAist

Read more from The 74: The bans have been a boon for a company that makes locked phone pouches. 

57 shootings a day: In schools nationwide, children are traumatized “not from bullets fired within, but from violence happening outside.” This must-read investigation by The Trace maps out the 188,080 shootings that unfolded within 500 yards of a school over the last decade. | The Trace

The Supreme Court will review a Biden administration effort to block state laws that ban transgender youth from accessing gender-affirming health care, including puberty blockers and hormone therapy. | The Associated Press

Meanwhile, the justices will not take up a case challenging a New Orleans school resource officer’s decision to tase a high school student with an intellectual disability during a violent outburst. A lower court rejected the student’s claim of excessive force. | Education Week 

‘Does he speak good English?’ My colleague Jo Napolitano is out with a groundbreaking investigation into the frequency with which schools nationwide reject enrollment to older immigrant students. | The 74 

Violent incidents are significantly less common in schools with anonymous tip lines than those without them, new federally funded research found. | National Institute of Justice

Editorial Board: “Without a visible presence like guards or weapons detectors, school security does indeed feel performative.” | The Seattle Times

Design firms ponder what a surgeon general’s warning on social media could look like. | Fast Company

Ohio lawmakers have approved legislation that would protect students from discrimination on the basis of their hairstyle. | Dayton Daily News

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ICYMI @The74

• ‘Astonishing’ Absenteeism, Trauma Rates Root of Academic Crisis
  
• ACLU Urges Six WV Schools to Review Student Policies Violating First Amendment
  
• More Weapons Showing Up in Washington’s Schools

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Emotional support

This is your morning reminder to do a lil stretch.

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