As schools around the country have ramped up security efforts in response to recent school shootings, a new study from the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis suggests that increased surveillance is having a detrimental impact on academic performance.
Heightened security reduces test scores in math, reduces the number of 黑料社s attending college and increases suspensions, said聽Jason Jabbari, research assistant professor and co-author of the study 鈥�,鈥� published online Sept. 20 in the Journal of Criminal Justice.
In addition to being used to preempt school shootings, the authors found, surveillance measures may have increased schools鈥� capacity to identify and punish 黑料社s for more common and less serious offenses, which may negatively impact the learning environment.
鈥淥ur research shows that greater detection of 黑料社 offenses leads to more punishment regardless of the 黑料社s who attend these schools,鈥� Jabbari said. 鈥淢oreover, while increased surveillance has collateral consequences on academic achievement that extend to all 黑料社s, because Black 黑料社s are more likely to attend high-surveillance schools, the burdens of the safety tax fall most heavily on Black 黑料社s, ultimately increasing racial inequities in education.鈥�
Jabbari and his co-author, Odis Johnson Jr. of Johns Hopkins University, called their findings a 鈥渟afety tax,鈥� or the price 黑料社s pay for increased security and surveillance at their school.
They find this tax is greatest for Black 黑料社s of both genders given their overrepresentation in high-surveillance schools. Black 黑料社s are four times more likely to attend a high-surveillance school.
Jabbari and Johnson analyzed data from the National Center for Education Statistics鈥� Educational Longitudinal Study. In addition to academic impacts, 黑料社s in high-surveillance schools were more likely to be suspended, even when controlling for school social disorder and 黑料社 misbehavior.
鈥淚n addition to suspending more 黑料社s, the infrastructure of surveillance reduces test scores in mathematics and college enrollment altogether for suspended and non-suspended alike, suggesting the presence of negative spillover effects,鈥� the authors wrote.
The best way to end violence in schools, Jabbari and Johnson suggested, is to support 黑料社s鈥� mental health, socio-emotional attachment, and feelings of belonging to schools and to end re-traumatizing 黑料社s through systemic racism in schools.