In Texas school districts, hundreds of tickets have been given to students, turning schoolyard shenanigans into Class C misdemeanors. Children as young as 6 years old have been ticketed, reported Dallas News.
Texas Appleseed, a nonprofit social justice advocacy group, Texas released a study on the ticketing titled "Texas' School-to-Prison Pipeline."
The report was authored by Deborah Fowler, legal director of Texas Appleseed. She said student misbehavior that would typically be handled by school management are now being referred to campus police.
"Disrupting class, using profanity, misbehaving on a school bus, student fights and truancy once meant a trip to the principal's office. Today, such misbehavior results in a Class C misdemeanor ticket and a trip to court for thousands of Texas students and their families each year."
Steve Perry, founder and principal of Capital Prep Magnet School, disagrees with the schools' strategy. He told CNN that the behavior of the students corresponds to the competence of the teacher and instead of focusing on discipline the schools should focus on the quality of their instructors.
"These people are out of their minds. It's a last ditch effort... If you cannot control children, you simply cannot work with children."
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