Thread by @MikaylaArciaga

#HB147 - the Governor’s Safe Schools Act passed out of the GA house today. This bill will absolutely lead to the racial profiling of Brown & Black kids and expose all kids to unnecessary harm at school in the form of armed intruder drills.

#GAPol 🧵/24

Some things to know:
1. Teachers have expressed valid concerns about school safety and have expressed interest in training. This is agreed upon by the many orgs who backed this bill. Including @GAEvoices @PAGE_EdNews @gsbacomm
That’s not really what #HB147 offers.
#GaPol

2. #HB147 creates a new, voluntary endorsement for educators through @Ga_PSC. An endorsement is like a merit badge for teacher training. This endorsement would train educators on multidisciplinary best practices for school safety and “identifying and deterring youth gangs” #GaPol

3. #HB147 commissions a handful of Georgia agencies to help develop this endorsement: GEMA & Homeland Security, Office of Juvenile Justice, and GA Public Safety Training Center.

Did you catch the theme? #GAPol

4. These agencies already offer gang-identification training by request - as it should be.
Gang activity doesn’t start in school, its based in the community and requires a coordinated response from school & community.
Not every school or community has gang activity.

The decision for anti-gang training should be made locally by the school, community, and local law enforcement because it takes alignment to implement intervention & prevention strategies with any meaningful fidelity.
It isn’t deputizing individual educators.
#HB147

5. Here’s the thing about gang identification as strategy -we’ve seen repeatedly the over- & mis-labeling of Black people, increasing the likelihood they are exposed to the criminal justice system. #HB147

nytimes.com/2020/02/03/opi…

6. We already know that Black & brown kids are harmed by educator bias in schools, and for our Hispanic & Latino students, training teachers to label kids as gang-involved raises even more concerns.

#HB147 #GaPol

ilrc.org/resources/depo…

And in case you’re saying, “maybe #HB147 will be more well-rounded than that.”
That is certainly possible, but when I went looking for examples of the trainings offered by the listed agencies, this is a brochure from 2020 I found.
#GaPol

7. Knowing our students might be involved with a gang does very little to help know how to support and educate them. I know we hate to admit it, but best practices for supporting these kids really is similar to what it is for all kids - strong, trusting relationships.
#HB147

Maybe that will be part of “multidisciplinary best practices”, but it’s hard to imagine they’ll get there when the majority of agencies involved are of the same discipline.

Especially when they’re putting out material like this:

#HB147 can and should exist without the “anti-gang” provisions. We can provide safety training to teachers who want it without labeling our kids and conflating educators with law enforcement.

If we are going to keep the gang provisions, we should ensure that the training goes far enough to equip educators with the cultural competence to make our schools safer for ALL kids. That may require looping in organizations that recognize even gang-involved kids are still kids.

As to the other part of #HB147, I should also say that I oppose active shooter drills, full stop.
But because our legislature refuses to pass reasonable gun control policy, we’ve got to work in the environment we’ve got. #GaPol

Some more things to know:

1. There is an increasing body of lit demonstrating that armed intruder drills, especially unannounced, inflict harm on kids, teachers, and parents. This includes a study from our very own @GeorgiaTech.

@NEAToday @Everytown #Hb147 #GaPol @sandyhook

nature.com/articles/s4159…

2. The Governor’s Safe Schools Act mandates that every school run an armed intruder drill at the beginning of the year and it’s supported by most of the major ed groups.

Important note: #HB147 DOES allow parent opt-out and DOES NOT require that drills be unannounced. #GaPol

3. Proponents of the bill are relying on what it doesn’t say to avoid opposing leadership. The go-to lines are “Unannounced drills aren’t mandated, just any drill, so schools don’t have to run them.” and “We’re a local control state so take it up with your local district.” #HB147

4. We know schools are running unannounced drills. They’re running them in Georgia.
Hiding behind local control is not only wildly irresponsible, it’s also deeply hypocritical. #HB147 #GaPol

When the same folks wanted to pass a bill (#HB1084) that would censor lessons about race in schools, they prescribed, down to the number of days, how the process would go. They passed a copy+paste template for districts to adopt. So if they wanted to, they would. #HB147 #GaPol

5. It is the responsibility of lawmakers to attempt to reduce harm, especially when handing down blanket mandates. Yet, there’s a vocal contingent that INSISTS *some* districts/schools should be running unannounced drills. Reminder: the science simply isn’t there. #GAPol #HB147

There are also folks who believe students won’t take things seriously if they always know it’s a drill. Apart from this being a deeply cynical view of young people, data shows that the fear of a shooting affects a majority of kids. #HB147
pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018…

So here’s where we are:
We know #HB147 is going to pass. It received bipartisan support with only 20 reps opposing it. Tbf - the minority party is in a weird spot because it’s backed by all the #EdPol big dogs.

So it’s down to regular folks to keep pushing back.

#HB147 will be on the senate side starting next week.

You can call your senator’s office and ask them to bring/support an amendment(s) prohibiting unannounced drills and removing the undue focus on gangs.

openstates.org

If we’re not going to invest in real, evidence-based strategies to make our schools safer, then we should protect all our kids from as much unnecessary harm as possible. It is truly the very least we can do.

#GaPol