A statewide coalition of superintendents is asking lawmakers to amend the 30-year-old law that is now 140 pages long.
TEXAS, USA — Many Texas school district superintendents say a law meant to keep schools safe is now having the opposite effect.
Wylie ISD Superintendent Dr. David Vinson told WFAA some classrooms have become downright dangerous.
As an example, Dr. Vinson pointed to one of his assistant principals who came into the office with two black eyes after an elementary school student headbutted her. And Vinson said they have no recourse in such situations.
“You have certain things that you can do if you’re in law enforcement. If they were in a hospital, you could restrain them to a bed in that situation. In public education, you’re just basically waiting to get them tired out because you have no ability,” Dr. Vinson told WFAA on Inside Texas Politics.
Dr. Vinson said Wylie ISD, a district with nearly 20,000 students, spent $1.5 million last year on only 12 problem students, something the district’s budget cannot sustain.
Lawmakers passed the Safe Schools Act in 1995 to help teachers address problem students.
But in the years since, lawmakers kept adding to the law, and Dr. Vinson said it’s now 140 pages long. And while the additions may have been well-intentioned, the superintendent said the law now severely limits how educators can discipline students.
Dr. Vinson now wants more leeway when it comes to discipline.
“We spent last legislative session making schools safe on the outside. And what we’re gonna try to do is provide some commonsense legislation to make a school safer on the inside,” the superintendent relayed.
The specific section of the law they want to change is known as Chapter 37, which addresses behavior management and student discipline.
For instance, Dr. Vinson said nowadays, if a student is disrupting a classroom, every other student in that class has to leave the room, while the student causing the problems stays in class all alone as teachers try to manage the situation.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, superintendents are asking lawmakers to allow them to provide online learning for suspended students who are at home, something they can’t do right now.
“We’re so good at pulling weeds and talking about everything that’s wrong with education. Let’s start planting some flowers about how they can change,” Dr. Vinson said. “We have a coalition from Slidell to Cy Fair. You know, from 150 kids to 105,000 kids that have joined our coalition. We had four more school districts join it last week.”
