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Alondra Davalos
Professor Bieber
English 115 HON
8 December 2015
Creating Criminals
What is a good way to see a decline in crime rate? By making sure teens graduate high
school. We are witnessing a crisis in California where primarily African American males from
low income families are dropping out of high school and winding up incarcerated. Not only is
this creating crime but as well an America where demand for low-skill workers is plunging.
Whos to blame? Our dropouts or our educational system? It is our educational system that fails
low-income, minority students and is creating a school-to-prison pipeline which impacts a
disproportionate number of young black males.
The graduation rate of African American students in the state of California continues to
be the lowest of any other ethnic group because of our school-to-prison pipeline. In a current
news release, Californias Department of Education stated that the graduation rates of most
student groups rose in 2014, However, for African American students, the rate is 68.1 percent,
unchanged from the year before. Unfortunately many of these students become victims of the
school-to-prison pipeline, many times winding up in prison. According to the Bureau of Justice
Statistics, over seventy percent of the incarcerated population are high school dropouts and
according to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, African
Americans now constitute nearly 1 million of the total 2.3 million incarcerated population. It is
evident that someone is failing African Americans and leading them to imprisonment. In the
article Study Finds High Rate of Imprisonment Among Dropouts Sam Dillion states that On

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any given day, about one in every 10 young male high school dropouts is in jail or juvenile
detention, compared with one in 35 young male high school graduates. The picture is even
bleaker for African-Americans, with nearly one in four young black male dropouts incarcerated
or otherwise institutionalized on an average day, the study said. Dropouts are winding up
incarcerated because they have no occupations and are spending their time on the streets
committing crimes. Kids are finding their education on the streets and not at school. For many
occupations a college diploma has replaced a high school one, consequently it is difficult for
these high school dropouts to obtain jobs.
This issue seems to significantly impact young, African American males. While there are
many factors which contribute to the high dropout rate, one of the main factors is ones
socioeconomic background. Matthew Lynch, Dean of the School of Education, states in the
article High School Dropout Rate: Causes and Costs that students from low income families
are 2.4 times more likely to dropout than middle-class kids, and over 10 times more likely than
high income peers to drop out. Although public education is free of costs to all many cannot
take advantage of it due to their socioeconomic background. Many students drop out of high
school to help support their household. Lynch also mentions in his article that being relocated
during ones high school years can be a motive to dropout. Kids that are relocated feel no
connects with their peers or teachers creating a feeling of alienation. They usually fall behind in
the classroom, lose motivation and just end up dropping out.
Now how does the school-to-prison pipeline contribute to the dropout rate of young
African Americans, the answer is simple schools push children into prisons. In the article How
Bad Is the School-to-Prison Pipeline Carla Amuro claims that far too often students of color
are suspended, expelled or even arrested for minor offenses. School policies disproportionately

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target students of color and those with a history of abuse, neglect, and poverty. Students are
forced out of school for disruptive behavior and are just being sent back to their homes and
neighborhoods where they are exposed to the streets and negative influences. Statistics show that
indeed children are being pushed into prisons by the educational system. Students face harsher
discipline and are more likely to be used out of school than white. 40% of black students from
U.S. schools are expelled yearly and 70% of students involved in in- school arrest are Black or
Latino. (Amuro) Sending kids to juvenile corrections is not putting kids out of risk but rather
feeding the school-to-prison pipeline. Our schools have become gateways to prison instead of
gateways to learning and higher education. Kids are no longer sent to the principle to receive
detention but rather school administration recourses to law enforcement to take care of the
problem.
Action must be taken and this school-to-prison epidemic must stop. This school-to-prison
pipeline reveals racially discriminatory practices in school disciplinary measures. The zerotolerance policy in schools is a policy of punishing any infraction of a rule, regardless of
accidental mistakes, ignorance, or extenuating circumstances. Jeff Deeney, social worker, argues
in the article How to Discipline Students without Turning School into Prison,that new
guidelines from the U.S. Departments of Justice and Education urge school to abandon zerotolerance policies. Supporters of the zero tolerance say that the policies are designed to tech
accountability and maintain order in our countrys schools. Although there should be
repercussions for serious offenses, schools are replying too much on law enforcement and courts
to take care of minor problems that kids create. Both the Civil Rights Data Collection and the
Departments of Education and Justice conducted a survey and found that Although AfricanAmerican students represent 15% of students in the CRDC, they make up 35% of students

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suspended once, 44% of those suspended more than once, and 36% of students expelled. Further,
over 50% of students who were involved in school-related arrests or referred to law enforcement
are Hispanic or African-American. (Deeney) The consequences for students are severe, leading
to an array of negative outcomes from increased juvenile criminal justice involvement to drug
use to lower academic achievement.
As a result of juveniles spending their time on the streets, may that be with gangs or
dealing drugs majority of them are being thrown in juvenile detentions. California spends more
money on juvenile detention and incarceration, than in solving the problems plaguing our
schools, especially those poorest performing. In the article Throwing Children in Prison Turns
Out to be a Really Bad Idea Brad Plumer states that juvenile detentions appears to be creating
criminals. A new paper by economists Anna Aizer and Joseph J. Doyle, Jr. shows that
incarcerating a child often reduces the chance that he or she will graduate high school. It also
raises the chance that the youth will commit more crimes later on in life. Not only is their
education being affected but many kids who end up behind bars end up making friends with
other offenders and building "criminal capital." Meaning that once out of these juvenile
detentions they will have friends to be on the streets with. Not only does this mean that they are
with bad company but they are more likely to continue committing crimes.
Alternative punishments are called for as a solution to this problem. Detention itself is
actually making things worse for kids. Economists Aizer and Doyles found that the kids who
ended up incarcerated were 13 percentage points less likely to graduate high school and 22
percentage points more likely to end up back in prison as adults than the kids who went to court
but were placed under home monitoring instead. Alternative punishments can often do just as
much to deter crime, but they don't do nearly as much long-term damage to the kids involved.

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Having such high numbers of dropouts does not only effect the dropout individually but
society as a whole. The U.S. Census Bureau estimates that high school dropouts earn just
$20,241 annually, which means they will usually need public assistance. According to Lynchs
article it is estimated that half of all Americans on public assistance are dropouts. Taxpayers are
effected by every dropout because it is them who pay for their needs. A study out of Northeastern
University found that high school dropouts cost taxpayers $292,000 over the course of their
lives. Incarceration of these dropouts is included in the cost as well. Taxpayers first pay for their
education and after for their incarceration.
It is evident that young African Americans male students in the state of California need
assistance. They need assistance to not become another statistic in the imprisonment rate of their
ethnicity. The change need to start in our school and the school-to-prison pipeline must be
broken. It is our educational system that it pushing kids out to the streets and getting them off the
track to an education. Troubled student can be motivated to do better, it just takes some patience
and school staff who care.

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Works Cited
Amurao, Carla. "Fact Sheet: How Bad Is the School-to-Prison Pipeline?" PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 2
Dec. 2015.
"Criminal Justice Fact Sheet." Criminal Justice Fact Sheet. National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People, n.d. Web. 15 November 2015.
Deeney, Jeff. "How to Discipline Students Without Turning School Into a Prison." The Atlantic.
Atlantic Media Company, 09 Jan. 2014. Web. 08 Dec. 2015.
Dillon, Sam. "Study Finds High Rate of Imprisonment Among Dropouts." The New York Times.
The New York Times, 08 Oct. 2009. Web. 26 Oct. 2015.
Harlow, Caroline Wolf. "Education and Correctional Populations." (2003): n. pag. Bureau of
Justice Statistics. Bureau of Justice Statistics, 15 Apr. 2003. Web. 23 Nov. 2015.
Plumer, Brad. "Throwing Children in Prison Turns out to be a Really Bad Idea." Washington
Post. The Washington Post, 15 June 2013. Web. 28 Oct. 2015.
Torlakson, Tom. "State Schools Chief Tom Torlakson Reports Record High Graduation Rate."
Graduation Rate at All-Time High. California Department of Education, 28 Apr. 2015.
Web. 15 November 2015.