Rockford schools no longer required to report battery, arson, robbery to police

Rockford Public Schools administrators no longer will be required to report group violence, robbery, battery, physical aggression or false alarms among other possibly illegal student activity to police under a revised code of conduct.

Those kind of student offenses will still be subject to potential suspensions and even expulsions.

But Director of Student Support David Graffy said that under a revised student code of conduct approved by the Rockford School Board for next school year, whether to report those matters to police will be left to the discretion of school principals and the parents or guardians of the victims.

"Our board is very cautious about police involvement within our buildings, not wanting to overly burden our students with putting them through the criminal justice system," Graffy said. "They would ultimately like to handle as many things in-house as possible with student discipline. So in this situation, here we have reduced the violations that require mandatory police notification moving forward in the 2024-25 code of conduct."

Reduce policing, racial disparities

Although until now those things including "gang related behavior" have been mandatory referrals to police, they did not necessarily result in citations or arrests, officials said. The changes come as the Rockford School Board has placed an emphasis on a reduction in policing students and reducing racial disparities in student discipline.

School Board Member Paul Carpenter said the changes give school personnel more discretion to differentiate between truly dangerous behavior that should be reported to police and juvenile mistakes that can be handled with school disciplinary measures.

"Just because they are not required to call to police doesn't mean they can't," Carpenter said. "Any kids that are doing things that are dangerous and putting people in harm's way, the police are still going to be called."

School officials still will be required to report instances of battery to members of school staff, sex assaults or the possession of alcohol, drugs, firearms and other weapons.

Through February of this school year, 1,602 students had committed a "level three" offense and 388 of the school system's 28,156 students had committed a "level four" offense — considered the most serious infraction of the school code.

Of those students with a level four offense, 231 or nearly 60% were Black, 61 or 16% were white, 49 or 13% were Hispanic, and 44 or 11% were multiracial.

Last year even as suspension and expulsion rates fell, 11% of the district's 7,096 white students were either suspended or expelled. Meanwhile, 22% of the district's 20,077 students of color were suspended or expelled.

Matter of safety

Not everyone agrees with reducing police involvement.

Rockford Education Association President Claudia Marshall said the union representing 1,876 teachers, social workers, school psychologists and nurses among others had little or no involvement in formulating the revised code of conduct.

Although Marshall said the code of conduct was billed as being developed in consultation with a "Parent-Teacher Advisory Committee," there was just one REA member, a school psychologist, on that committee.

Marshall said excluding police from potential public safety issues in schools is not the answer to making schools safer.

"The RPS 205 School District did not collaborate with the Rockford Education Association on the changes made to the Student Code of Conduct," Marshall said in an email to the Rockford Register Star. "The safety of students and staff are essential to creating a healthy learning environment. Working with our partners in law enforcement helps us as educators to best identify situations that could cause greater harm to the school community. The involvement of law enforcement is not a negative act. They are community experts in public safety and involving them helps us ensure we have safe schools."

The wrong way

Involvement in the criminal justice system puts youth on the wrong path, increases the chances of recidivism, delinquent behavior and adult incarceration, while decreasing educational achievement and lifetime earnings, studies show.

The district's nearly 400 paraprofessionals who are part of AFSCME Local 692 support the district's move toward reducing police involvement in school discipline matters and want to be more involved in the process, said Sara Dorner, staff representative for AFSCME Council 31.

Dorner said school, vocational, classroom and other aides want to play a bigger role early in the disciplinary process. And they want to take part in Individualized Educational Program discussions, staff meetings and workshops.

Hiring more staff to support students and teachers should be a focus if the district wants to improve discipline in schools, Dorner said.

"They all agreed that policing children out of the schools is not the answer," Dorner said. "We want to keep our children in the schools and work on these problems collaboratively with the school district."

Jeff Kolkey writes about government, economic development and other issues for the Rockford Register Star. He can be reached at (815) 987-1374, via email at jkolkey@rrstar.com and on X @jeffkolkey.

This article originally appeared on Rockford Register Star: Rockford schools get more discretion over when to contact police