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A PRIL 18, 2012
P ORTLAND , O REGON
V OLUME XXXIV, N O .16
25
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C HALLENGING P EOPLE TO S HAPE A B ETTER F UTURE N OW
Georgia
6-Yr.-Old
Arrested
FOR SCHOOLS
Handcuff case
renews school
policing debate
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — A New
Mexico teacher asked a 13-year-old girl to
stop talking with her friend and move to
another seat. The girl refused. The teacher
called the police.
The case is among thousands across the
country fueling a long-simmering debate
over when educators should bring in the
police to deal with disruptive students. A 6-
year-old Georgia kindergartner became the
latest test case last week when she was
hauled off in steel handcuffs after throwing
books and toys in a school tantrum.
(See The Skanner News’ series ‘The
School
to
Prison
Pipeline,’
http://www.theskanner.com/article/Suspen-
sions-and-Expulsions-of-Black-Students-
The-School-to-Prison-Pipeline-2012-03-06
)
“Kids are being arrested for being kids,”
said Shannon Kennedy, a civil rights attor-
ney who has filed a class-action lawsuit
against Albuquerque’s public school district
and its police department on behalf of hun-
dreds of kids arrested for minor offenses
over the past few years, including having
cellphones in class, destroying a history
book and inflating a condom.
Police were put in many schools across
the country in the 1990s in response to zero
tolerance policies and tragedies like the
Columbine High massacre. But many over-
whelmed teachers and principals began
turning to those officers to handle discipli-
nary issues that in years past would have
landed students in detention.
Frustrated teachers aren’t getting enough
support from above to deal with increasing-
ly extreme student behavior, from sexual
harassment in elementary school to children
throwing furniture, said Ellen Bernstein,
president of the Albuquerque teachers’
union.
PHOTO BY LISA LOVING
By Jeri Clausing
The Associated Press
Students at the Harriet Tubman Young Women’s Leadership Academy attended the City of Portland Equity
Department reception for newly-hired civil rights official Dante James. The girls asked local VIPs to help them save
their school, which has a math, science and engineering focus.
Would You Please Save Our School?
Tubman, Humboldt families fighting to keep the doors open
By Lisa Loving
Of The Skanner News
M
onday night’s Port-
land Public Schools
Board “study ses-
sion” is shaping up to be the
Waterloo of the Harriet Tub-
man Young Women’s Leader-
ship Academy.
Back on the chopping block
after many years of barely
escaping the budget axe, Tub-
man, the city’s only public all-
girls school, is once again
fighting for its life, as is Hum-
boldt, which is scheduled to be
absorbed by Boise Eliot.
After this week’s “study ses-
sion” on the school, Portland
Public Schools spokesman
Matt Shelby confirmed Tues-
day that the district has moved
to “draft the formal resolu-
tions” to close the Harriet Tub-
man
Young
Women’s
Leadership Academy despite
impassioned pleas from the
school’s community and local
elected leaders.
The district moved to fast-
track the closure, separating
Tubman from the rest of the
district budget, which is decid-
ed in May – the Tubman vote
is next Monday, April 23.
The district will also be voting
in May on whether to close
down Another North Portland
school, Humboldt, and merge
its students with Boise-Eliot
because neither school has
enough students, district offi-
cials say.
At a “study session” held last
night – the last opportunity for
public input before the closure
decision – State Sen. Chip
Shields apologized to the Port-
land Public Schools Board for
“the hand you were given” by
the legislature earlier this year,
which has resulted in a $27.5
million cut to PPS’s budget;
last year PPS faced $20 million
in cuts.
Shields was joined by State
Rep. Lew Frederick and Port-
land City Commissioner
Amanda Fritz in pleading with
the district to reconsider, even
pledging help in fundraising,
public relations and marketing
to help the school attract more
students.
All three cited the impact of
See SCHOOLS on page 3
See HANDCUFFS on page 3
INDEX
News ................2,3,5,6
Opinion .....................4
A & E ......................5,8
Food..........................6
Bids/Classifieds ..........7
Jailin Gage: Scholar, Athlete, Teenager
How one freshman at Jefferson High School puts it all together
By Bruce Poinsette
Special To The Skanner News
T
he first thing that stands out about
Jefferson High School guard Jailin
Gage is his humility.
“I don’t want to put everything on me,” he
says, with his father Johnnie and brother
Johnnie Jr. at his side.
Gage, who is also an honor roll student,
led the school’s freshman basketball team to
an undefeated season and averaged 24
points a game. He goes to great lengths to
praise his coach, teammates and family
influences for his success, both on the court
and in the classroom.
“It would’ve been rough without my
teammates,” says Gage. “They really helped
back me up.”
The Jefferson freshman team’s success
has fans excited for the Jefferson Class of
2015.
It has also helped Gage attract attention
from one of the top basketball schools in the
nation, Oak Hill Academy. Current Nation-
al Basketball Association (NBA) players
who have played at Oak Hill, which is a fix-
ture in national high school rankings,
See STUDENT on page 8