CHICAGO (CN) — The Chicago Board of Education on Thursday voted unanimously to remove uniformed police officers from 39 public schools across the city as soon as next fall.
The move comes nearly a month after Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson gave the board clearance to end its $10.3 million contract with the Chicago Police Department. Local activists have long called for cops to be removed from schools, citing research that shows disparate policing of Black students and students with disabilities.
At a board meeting on Thursday, Elizabeth Todd-Breland, vice president of the Board of Education, said a vast majority of schools in Chicago do not have a police presence.
The resolution to remove police was about more than just school resource officers, she added. She said it's also an investment and expansion of holistic school safety, which aims to address the root causes of misconduct.
Aaron Kupchik, a professor of sociology and criminal justice at the University of Delaware who has specialized in school policing for the past 15 years, echoed others' concerns about school police. He noted that there is no consistent evidence that police presence in schools reduces crime.
“It’s really unclear whether they promote or result in more safety,” Kupchik said. Schools across the country, as well as many policymakers, have worked off an assumption that is simply not backed by data, he said.
Opponents of the change say that it should be left to the Local School Councils, which serve as the governing body for each Chicago public school, to determine whether individual schools need police officers.
Activists put pressure on former Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot to remove police from schools shortly after the height of the George Floyd protests in 2020. Ultimately, Lightfoot put the decision back in the hands of the Local School Councils.
Alderperson Daniel La Spata of the 1st Ward told the board on Thursday that "blood is going to be on your hands" if something happens because of the lack of police officers in schools.
Board member Tanya Woods disagreed with the characterization that the decision on school police ultimately falls to Local School Councils. She noted that state law requires the Board of Education to deal with disciplinary proceedings.
Ahead of Thursday's meeting, the school board and the Department of Student Voice and Engagement hosted a roundtable with high school students and board members to discuss school-safety solutions.
Many students voiced concerns about how school resource officers can add fuel to the fire in their attempts to resolve conflict.
Alderperson Jessie Fuentes, of the 26th ward, recalled an instance when she was a school principal. A child got put in handcuffs for drumming on his desk with pencils, she said — a disruption that would typically be addressed by a teacher.
Before the vote, several students from the roundtable presented their school-safety recommendations to the board. Among them: more social-emotional learning positions and additional resources to promote staff and students’ mental health.
Chicago Teachers Union Vice President Jackson Potter rehashed the students’ recommendations, saying CTU members have long advocated for more social workers in schools — and fewer officers.
“Most Chicagoans will choose healing over more pain,” he said.
Many elected officials agree with Potter and the students on the need for more mental health resources and restorative justice in schools.
“The punitive approach fails to address the underlying issues and diverts resources,” Anthony Quezada, the Cook County Commissioner for the 8th ward, said.
Kupchik, the school-policing expert, also reiterated calls for restorative justice in schools.
He said the greatest way to maintain school safety is a positive social climate where kids feel included, valued and respected. Police in schools inherently erodes that climate, he said, "as well-intentioned and as kind as they may be."
Chris Curran, an associate professor of educational leadership and policy at the University of Florida, likened police presence in schools to heavily-armed officers stationed outside of airports.
They're meant to be helpful, Curran said, but heavy police presence can often leave people wondering "what danger do they know about that I don't?"
Current Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson campaigned on removing police officers from Chicago’s public schools when he ran for mayor but did not make the change when he took office last June.
“Armed officers have no place in schools in communities already struggling with over-incarceration, criminalization, profiling and mistrust,” Johnson said in a campaign questionnaire with the Chicago Sun-Times and WBEZ.
Miriam Bhimani, a local activist and former Chicago public school teacher, said that while she’s happy that police are being removed from schools, the impact would be stronger had Johnson acted sooner. She noted that Johnson appointed his board in July 2023 and could’ve cancelled the intergovernmental agreement with CPD.
“I don't think it will be a direct issue in the elected school board race, but it makes for a weaker change,” she said.
“Now, we will have a new board [that is] not mayorally appointed seated in January 2025,” Bhimani added. “If that board decides that they want police back in the schools, or they want to give control back to local school councils, which is the Lori Lightfoot system, that could happen within months of the school year starting.”
All of that may not even matter. A bill currently working its way through the state legislature would require CPS to maintain the school resource officers for any schools that choose to opt in to the program.
The bill, sponsored by Democratic state Representative Mary Gill and co-sponsored by a bipartisan group of eight other House members, was referred to the House Rules Committee on Feb. 8. The committee has not voted on the legislation.
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