A recent study conducted by The Council of the Great City Schools shows that the Milwaukee Public School system has the highest suspension rate in America. MATC TV Production students helped out at a “How to Make Milwaukee Schools Better” discussion held to address this issue.Over the last year, 26.4% of students were suspended at least once, and many of them multiple times, with a total of 86,675 suspensions from 2007-2008.
On September 23, students from the MATC TV Production department, under the direction of Executive Producer Raul Galvan from MPTV, transmitted a live event where students, parents, teachers and city officials gathered to discuss “Discipline and Violence Reduction” inside Milwaukee Public Schools. The event was held in the Marshall High School Auditorium.
All panelists agreed that in order to make our schools safer and better, we have to start with family values at home. Unfortunately, many students come from broken homes or are abandoned.
Ramel Smith, who worked as a school psychologist for five years and currently works at the Children’s Hospital in the child protection center, says that every day he sees a child who has been abused, a girl who has been raped by her father, or a boy who has been neglected by his parents. Children who have been hurt by the main person in their life who was supposed to love them, find it more difficult to establish relationships with other people as they grow older.
So when we talk about this violence that has been manifesting itself inside the schools, so many times it is these children who have been hurt inside their hearts and inside their homes.
In a video presentation during the discussion, Lori Cameron, a psychologist at the Milwaukee Public Schools Violence Prevention Program, says, “We (the teachers) are the prevention. It’s not what you do to discipline your students, it’s what you can do to keep them focused on school, with a positive attitude and good discipline. Here at the program, we have workshops for our MPS teachers on Behavior Management, Conflict Resolution Curriculum, Social Skills and Anger Management.”
Martin Lexmond, director of Department of School Innovations, admitted that MPS knows it has a problem with suspensions and is attacking it directly. He added that the answer to this problem is more tolerance. Instead of pushing our students away, we need to drag them closer and help them. Suspension is not the answer.
