GiveSan Rafael credit for ending SRO program

Earlier this month, the current board of San Rafael City Schools made history by joining the six other school boards in the United States who have voted to cut ties with their regional police departments and therefore, school resource officers (“San Rafael ends school resource officer program,” Sept. 18).

In case you are unfamiliar with the term, SROs are armed law enforcement officials who patrol school campuses. Almost every school and school district in Marin County has an assigned officer, and this is a major problem. We cannot talk about building a more anti-racist Marin without talking about SROs and campus security.

What we need to know is that national and local data has shown that SROs disproportionately search, cite, arrest and otherwise target non-White students of color. An example of this racially biased overcriminalization of youth can be found in San Rafael, where Latino and Black students make up 90% of issued citations despite making up only 61% of the district’s student population.

This consistent targeting of youth of color enforces institutional racism, and can be seen perpetuating student trauma and bolstering the schoolto-prison pipeline in Marin County schools. While SROs initially gained popularity as a response to an increase in school shootings, data has shown that officers have not in fact provided protection when these horrific events have occurred.

If we truly want to invest in the safety of all students, we need to begin at the individual level through the funding of counselors, school psychologists and community services like the Marin Mobile Crisis Team. Marin County school boards and city councils must vote to cut ties with SROs and take the first step away from perpetuating racism in our schools.

— Emma Newman,

San Geronimo