Word: cincinnatis
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...basement of Dater Junior High, just next to the boiler room and marked off by thick prison bars, school officials have crafted a fate worse than algebra class. Teachers at the school, part of the Cincinnati, Ohio, public school district, simply call it "the dungeon." Students have more descriptive -- if unprintable -- names for the small windowless cell. Though the prison bars are just painted on the cinder-block entrance, the punishment is real. Delinquent students must remain in the room -- absolutely quiet -- all day, even eating at their desks. "It's so hot and so boring," moans a seventh grader...
...effectiveness of pedagogic hard labor but the race of the punished and the race of the punishers. Black students are twice as likely to end up in the dungeon as white students; in fact, black students are twice as likely to end up disciplined throughout the entire Cincinnati public school system. It is a particularly awkward statistic for a school district mired in a 20-year-old desegregation suit. So awkward, in fact, that the board of education has agreed to an explosive remedy: if a judge concurs, the Cincinnati public schools (CPS) will soon start tracking the race...
School officials insist that the racial data are just one small element in a comprehensive plan to help Cincinnati teachers deal with discipline problems. "It is a time-honored method of enforcing civil rights laws to keep statistics," says William Taylor, another attorney for the plaintiffs. "There is no reason to believe that the information will be misused." Brandt says "an administrator needs good info." He has a point. Even assuming that teachers are justified in sending twice as many blacks as whites to the assistant principal -- nationwide, black students are disciplined in disproportionate numbers -- what about the teacher...
...Shanker, president of the American Federation of Teachers. "Basically, teachers will throw in the towel and say, 'Why should I get into trouble?' " He compares the proposal to requiring police to make racially balanced arrests. Kathy Nemann, a seventh-grade history teacher at Crest Hills Middle School in north Cincinnati, agrees. "Teachers will simply stop referring students for discipline," she says. "They'll handle the problem in the classroom"-at the expense of all students. Donald Mooney Jr., attorney for the Cincinnati Federation of Teachers, says, "Whether you call it p.c. or whatever, it is still a form of intimidation...
...wonder if the kid might have a gun." The union says teachers started to lose control in 1988, when the district abolished corporal punishment while directing administrators to reduce suspensions. "Before long, the students were running the schools," complains Tom Mooney, Don's brother and president of the Cincinnati teachers' union...