Arrested Futures Revisited: Springfield

The Ongoing Impact of the School-to-Prison Pipeline

The school-to-prison pipeline incorporates both school discipline and school-based arrests contributing to the funneling effect from the education system to the prison. More than ten years after CfJJ co-authored the Arrested Futures report, focusing on school-based arrests in Massachusetts’ largest school districts – Boston, Springfield, and Worcester Public Schools, this report revisits school discipline and arrest data concerning Springfield Public Schools (SPS). Despite state-wide legislative progress in the last decade, the school-to-prison pipeline ultimately depends on policies, practices, and dynamics at the municipal and school levels. From the data and interviews presented in this report, Springfield still has significant work to do to slow and ultimately stop the school to prison pipeline.

Select Key Findings

  • Black students are overrepresented among disciplined SPS students. Between 2017-2022, Black students made up between 18-19% of the Springfield school population but 19-24% of students disciplined.

  • Students with disabilities or low household income are overrepresented among disciplined SPS students. Between 2017-2022, both of these subgroups were disciplined disproportionately to their share of the student population.

  • Springfield consistently over-arrests its Black students compared with their make-up of the school population. Within the past five school years, Black students account for up to 47% of school-based arrests, despite only accounting for 18-19% of the school population.

  • Springfield’s Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Springfield Police Department (SPD) still lacks safeguards and requirements outlined by the state’s model MoU. The lack of these safeguards results in students who are less protected from punitive responses to mental health emergencies, SRO appointments without community involvement, and parents without the guarantee to submit anonymous complaints within the school feedback system.

  • Conversations with SPS students suggest that over-policing within schools has eroded trust between students and adults. Students are quoted describing SROs as “unnecessary,” “triggering,” and sometime acting inappropriately toward female students thereby causing more harms than good by inducing feelings of anxiety.

Select Recommendations

Based on the above findings, CfJJ recommends that Springfield Public Schools (SPS) focus on restorative justice practices, rather than focusing on police presence and punitive responses to school discipline. In particular, we recommend the following:

  1. Schools should focus on systems of respect, care, and equity in order to increase feelings of academic and emotional support as well as decrease racial disparities in disciplinary rates.

  2. The City of Springfield should conduct a thorough and public audit of the SPS Special Education department to ensure discipline is not the primary response to behaviors caused by a student’s disability, as well as to confirm that all students are receiving resources to thrive and meet their goals within the school system.

  3. SPS should remove police from school settings, instead implementing restorative justice practices and bolstering safeguards and non-punitive alternatives for students with disabilities.

  4. Action should be taken to address high arrest rates within Springfield schools, including yearly training for all staff on the provisions to the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), considering alternative methods to address classroom disruptions, and increasing training on identifying students with emotional disabilities.

  5. Springfield should update their Memorandum of Understanding to comply with state guidelines, and should ensure the implementation and accountability of its enforcement.

  6. In order to foster an environment of physical and emotional safety for all students, schools should end surveillance practices that give police unrestricted access to school data and implement de-escalation and non-punitive responses when addressing disciplinary issues.

  7. Communal and parental voices should be central, with schools implementing a feedback mechanism for family members to express opinions and concerns regarding school climate.