Eva Moskowitz: Questions and Answers About the Role of School Safety

For this assignment, I interviewed former City Councilwoman and head of Success Charter Network Eva Moskowitz regarding School Safety officers in NYC Public Schools. The interview is below:

1. Were you involved in the original decision to allow school safety officers to have a role in schools?

I was not an elected an official in 1998, but I supported in my campaign a merging of School Safety and the DOE. It seemed that the police department needed to be involved because school violence in 1998 was at an all time high. There were pretty low paid security agents that were not well trained. While the police department has its share of problems, there is a lack of professionalism with School Safety officers and having NYPD training and accountability would increase school safety accountability.

2. What do you think the role of school safety officers should be?

My vision is that the School Security agent should be part of school safety. However, the Principal needs to have a good relationship with school safety. In some schools security agents are barking at kids. Security agents and school community vision should be aligned. They should not be paid to show up. We have to have a shared way of speaking to kids. It is hard to have that because Safety Officers come and go and transfer in a willy-nilly way. There is not good training. We need fewer of them overall and better training. They also need to learn to talk to kids; how you would speak to someone that you are about to arrest is different than how you should talk to kids. Their role should be de-escalating and be utterly respectful of children and adolescents. It is not currently very effective. Conversely, school leadership relies on safety agent in schooling. This is an utter failure of leadership – school safety can’t create order in classroom. They have not been trained to do so.

3. Current research is showing that the presence of school safety is having a variety of negative effects on students, including the rise of criminalizing behavior that was once considered part of school administrator authority. What are the alternatives to criminalization in schools?

There are absolutely alternatives. I would argue that we have to start with a culture of order and responsibility. The school shouldn’t be as disorderly as they are and school safety isn’t equipped to address these problems. They should be a tiny part of the process but it is truly the school principal and leaders and teachers that set a tone of safety and respect. If you don’t have that you can’t achieve anything.

4. Your network of schools primarily serves high-poverty areas. These schools are similar in demographic to student populations that are targeted for school safety increases. What alternatives do you see for schools that over-rely on police presence in schools?

The alternatives require training principals and teachers. It is a difficult skill to create a sense of order. Some of our schools have sense of calm and order at a high level and it is painstakingly created. Once you have it, it has to be cultivated, and it is so much easier to teach. The lives of teachers are easier. We have to train people and it takes a lot of work. In the DOE there isn’t enough time to train teachers – there won’t be success if you don’t set people up to be successful.