Police in schools: Minneapolis school board weighs pros and cons

The vote to keep police officers in schools is looming in Minneapolis' public schools, and the school board is finding itself in a dilemma: Should it continue the district's use of school resource officers, scale them back or scrap them altogether?

With the controversial issue set to hit their agenda in July, board members heard the district's three potential scenarios at a Tuesday meeting.

Superintendent Ed Graff said the district will continue to ask for feedback from the community "to try and solicit information around these different scenarios that we have created."

Community views on police in schools run the gamut. In September, then-Minneapolis NAACP President Nekima Levy-Pounds told the board that school resource officers (SROs) come from the Minneapolis Police Department and called out police officers' "racial profiling" of minorities. Stephen Flisk, the district's deputy chief of schools, said he's heard that school principals generally support keeping school resource officers.

The district's contract with the city for the officers expires June 30, but the board won't vote on it until August, Flisk said.

Under the current contract, which the board extended in September, the 16 officers cost Minneapolis schools $1.28 million. That was bumped up by $75,000 because of a salary increase in the officers' union contract.

The bulk of Tuesday's meeting focused on data on districtwide suspensions and student viewpoints on school climate and safety. District data showed that the number of eighth-graders suspended in the first term and third quarter fell between this year and last.

Roughly half of the white students surveyed said school resource officers almost always treat students from their racial/ethnic group the same as those in other groups. Fewer students of color — nearly 40 percent of Asian, Hispanic and black students and 35 percent of American Indian students — said they felt the same way.

Board Members Kim Ellison and KerryJo Felder raised concerns about the officers, while member Nelson Inz said he's looking forward to hearing more community feedback before the vote.

The board's student representative Gabriel Spinks, an Edison High School sophomore who's a nonvoting member, talked about the value of police in schools.

"SROs is a way to try and strengthen that relationship between minorities and police officers, and if we take them out, I don't know what's going to happen there," he said.

Beena Raghavendran • 612-673-4569