Criminalizing kids: What’s happening in communities

Introduction

Students of color and those with disabilities face encounters with law enforcement at school at a higher rate than their peers.

That’s according to an analysis of the latest student referral to police data from the Department of Education. The Center for Public Integrity in collaboration with USA TODAY and Univision examined these disparities on a national level.

In order to understand what’s happening in schools, communities need to understand student to police referrals on a local level.

That’s why we collaborated with media organizations across the country. We shared the data, our findings and our data reporting expertise when needed with the journalists who know their communities best.

Stories from our partners