Rally held to demand passage of Student Safety Act
Via Weekly Thikana and Transalated by Moinuddin Naser.

New York - 5 Nov (VoBD) - A rally was held October 22 in front of City Hall to demand that the New York City Council pass the Student Safety Act [Intro. 816-2008]. The Urban Youth Collaborative, an organization devoted to human rights activists, organized the rally in which leaders from different activist groups - including Desis Rising Up and Moving (DRUM) and the New York Civil Liberties Union - spoke. The rally, which was led by Bangladeshi youth organizer Shormila Piyanka, involved several hundred student activists from all over the city. Chasity Soriano, a student at the Bushwick School for Social Justice, told her distressing story of being arrested and harassed by school safety agents for what she called "silly issues."

Speaking at the rally, she said that she was taken into custody by the school's safety agents after they found her arguing with one of her classmates. In the office, she was tied to a chair as the agent warned her to "keep silent." Upon hearing of the incident, her mother came to the school and assured them that her daughter "would not behave like that anymore." Soriano said that although she was released by the agents, she was suspended from school for five days and had a hard time catching up in the classes she missed.

Soriano said that the incident had shocked her. She felt very embarrassed in front of her teachers and parents. Now, three years later, she feels it tarnished her dignity. "They behaved like beasts in the way they treated me. I wasn't even that angry at my classmate. They could have dealt with this in a much less severe way." Soriano believes that if school agents were trained properly, no one would have to suffer the same embarrassment that she did.

"Now I am 15 years old and a ninth grader. I think that many students in schools across the country are being treated the same way they treated me three years ago. When I go to school, I am still subjected to harassment, pushing, taunting and illegal searches. This is regular routine. I always thought that school was supposed to be a safe place, where we can study in a peaceful environment and talk with friends during recess. But it's totally different. There is always the fear of being harassed by the safety agents. They arrest students for the smallest things. I thought that school safety agents were supposed to protect us, but really, their behavior scares us. I want to go to a school where I don't have to be scared. This is why we are here today: to demand the immediate passage of the Student Safety Act!" Of the 51 members of the New York City Council, 32 have acknowledged the importance of this issue by co-sponsoring the Act, but the other 19 have yet to respond.

Councilwoman Melissa Mark Viverito and the Legal Director of the New York Civil Liberties Union also spoke at the rally, as demonstrators chanted, "No more delay! Pass it now! Keep the police out of our school! We're not criminals!"

In a speech, the spokesperson for the New York Civil Liberties Union stated that 5,200 police officers maintain security in New York City Public Schools. They enter school campuses almost at random, even though New York and United States law prohibit them from entering school grounds without the permission of school officials. They create a tense and fearful environment for the students, which is detrimental to their fundamental rights. It was further alleged that school principals are partly responsible, because they give in and let such situations occur. On average, school safety agents have filed 1,200 complaints against students. Of those, 77 percent are minor misdemeanors and not treated as crimes. Due to the recession, many allocations for schools have been curtailed; however, $88 million is being spent for police forces engaged in school safety.

The City Council will hold a hearing and vote on the Student Safety Act on November 10, at 12 p.m. That same day, there will be a press conference in front of City Hall. Shoshi Chowdhury, a DRUM organizer, stressed that 19 councilmen have yet to support the Act. Organizers carried posters with mentions of those councilmen during the rally.