Pushout: The Criminalization of Black Girls in Schools

by Monique W. Morris

The myth of the “bad” Black woman is rooted in the historical assumption that Black women possess an elevated level of sexuality beyond other women, that they are eager for sexual exploits, or that they are “loose in their morals.” Therefore they are perceived, as they have been historically, as deserving “none of the considerations and respect granted to White women.”

Slavery made her the only woman in America for whom virtue was not an ornament and a necessity.11

“Those men have to train those girls to be scared of them, to make them not want to leave,” Paris continued. “We be like, ‘Girl, child, we’ll leave, we’ll go on the block one night and we’ll disappear.’ But a lot of them men store

Black girls present to the public when they are still under the watchful eye of their predator, pimp, and/or gang. Brantley argues that sexually exploited Black girls are not choosing to participate in the sex trade; they are in the traumatic throes of a “domino effect” of choices made for them. “Did they choose to grow up in poverty?” she asks. “Did they choose sexual abuse? Did they

From fourth through sixth grade my friends and I, like many others our age, played a game during recess called Hide and Go Get It. It was a variation of hide-and-seek in which boys would chase the girls and then “go get it.” “Go get what?” I remember asking a classmate one day during recess.

At nearly 19 percent, the rate of sexual victimization for Black girls and young women is among the highest for any group in the nation.16 Girls experience sexual assault, objectification, or being seen as hypersexual in many places—including their homes, in the street, on buses and subway systems, in their places of worship, and in schools.

“TV plays a role, too,” Michelle chimed in. “And I seen something on Facebook yesterday.” “I’m not going to lie,” Nala said. “I do engage that VH-1 Love and Hip-Hop or whatever. . . .” The group laughed. For many in the group, watching reality television was a guilty pleasure.

But it has gone from like, The Cosby Show, Family Matters, [and shows] that actually had like . . . families and everything to ‘Oh, this chick is just trying to have a baby by me and take my money.’ We have that to look forward to on television.”

Dress codes, for all of their benefits, have become a tool of oppression. School structures often fail to recognize their role in facilitating the punishment—and policing—of Black girls’ sexuality. Marcus, the same high school dean who noted that Black girls were “not docile,” felt that dress codes are an important part of establishing the school climate.

Yet the girls who spoke with me never turned clothes into an excuse not to go to school. To the contrary, dress codes actively turned them away from school. They repeated several stories of showing up to school only to be turned away for something minor—like a belt missing, or the wrong color shoes—rather than a blatant affront to the dress code. For some of these students, the shoes they wore were the only shoes in their closets, and the absence of a belt was an oversight.

“I think the reason they do that is the boys . . . sometimes the boys could be more attracted to the Black girls, especially when it comes to body shape, and they think it’s going to distract the boys, so they do tell the Black girls to cover up, because that’s who the boys are looking at,” Shamika said. “They are looking at the Black girls. They are looking at the White girls [too], but they’re looking at their faces. They’re not finna really cover up the White girls.”

It’s notable that Shamika felt boys were attracted to White girls’ faces but to Black girls’ bodies. And that she didn’t pause or skip a beat in explaining as much.

“So if they’re not looking at your face, what do you think are they looking at?” I asked. “They’re looking at your butt or your boobs,” Shamika responded. “Can you feel...

“Even though I’m a small . . . very flat . . . African American female . . . a petite female,” Charisma said, “I still feel that no matter what a Black girl do, no matter how small she is or how big she is, a man is going to always look at her sexually. No matter what. That’s how I feel.”

Whether in the community or at school, age compression (discussed in Chapter 1) is a phenomenon that is often thrust upon Black girls. However, these girls are girls, not fully

Girls (37 percent) are more likely than boys (25 percent) to be detained for status offenses and technical violations rather than for crimes that actually present a danger to public safety.4 Girls (21 percent) are also more likely than boys (12 percent) to be detained for sexual assault (cases that may include commercially sexually exploited children) and public disorder cases, including those that may include public drunkenness or scuffles.

It took Blossom four years to stabilize Juanita through medicine, counseling, education, employment, and intense mentorship. But they did it.

This focus has maintained its imprint on the quality of education that girls receive in confinement—girls who are disproportionately Black.

Since the eighteenth century, girls who were in trouble with the law, even as part of the enslaved population, were confined in semi-penal institutions: asylums, jails, reformatories, and other homes. Between 1825 and 1828, the United States opened its first juvenile reformatories in New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, for the purpose of providing

As Khalil Muhammad notes in The Condemnation of Blackness, “Black women’s perceived moral shortcomings or racial ‘defects’ disqualified them from the protective status of the law . . . the problem was ‘located in Black women themselves.’”

W.E.B. Du Bois to refer to those in the “criminal classes,” including prostitutes and “loafers.”18 They were also regarded as “incorrigible” and “neurotic,” suggesting that their form of criminality or delinquency was innate and not something that could be critically examined and corrected in the context of their environment.

Black women and girls were subject to a masculinization of their behaviors if they challenged authority, asserted independence, or attempted to mitigate their impoverished and sometimes violent physical environment by striking back (or, in some cases, first).

Nationwide, 81 percent of girls in the juvenile justice system suffer from a mental health disorder.34 In California, the percentage of youth with a mental health disorder ranges between 40 and 70 percent.35

Again, the inability for girls to ask questions—clarifying or otherwise—was perceived as a problem by multiple girls getting their education in juvenile hall. Credit recovery was also a hurdle for Deja to overcome.

Just as in district schools—as discussed in previous chapters—Black girls are confronted by teachers who argue with them, avoid answering their questions, and label them as “difficult” for standing up for themselves or others they believe have been treated unfairly. However, while students perceive this relationship to be problematic, they also want to be engaged by their teachers, to be loved by them.

Many teachers are struggling to provide a meaningful educational experience for girls in the criminal legal system who are experiencing multiple risk factors that affect their well-being. Even if the desire to connect with their female students is present, some teachers may be shutting down communication or rejecting the notion that they should teach more than the curriculum because they have not been adequately equipped to handle the downpour once it’s invited.

While few would disagree that the ultimate goal is to prevent more girls from going to correctional facilities at all, more often than not juvenile court schools exacerbate the problems more than they contribute to the solutions. They should be serving as an important rehabilitative structure for detained girls. The schools inside juvenile hall represent the first chance for girls to reenter their home communities

Education is likely to be their best chance to shape a better life—their best chance to rebound from their conviction histories and emerge as productive, engaged citizens capable of charting new paths toward redemption.

As potential places for developing the whole person, schools, whether in facilities or communities, can and should be transformative environments that help girls make better decisions in their lives. A school with professionals devoted to developing, not unraveling, Black girls’ academic well-being and their mental health would provide a foundation for cultivating new ways

“Which periods did you cut most?” I asked. “Math and physiology. I loved physiology class because I loved learning about the human body, but I didn’t like the teacher, and so that’s why I never went to that class. . . . Every time I went to that class, I either cussed her out

I’m mad at myself that I couldn’t juggle both. Black girls internalize very early on the idea that their well-being comes secondary to others’.

But substituting “All” for “Black” obscures the specific resistance to the anti-Black racism and bias that are frequently at the root of police violence, use of excessive force, harassment, and other injustices. So yes, all girls experience injustice, and all of it matters. Boys, specifically boys of color, are incarcerated at unjustifiable

six themes emerged as crucial for cultivating quality learning environments for Black girls: (1) the protection of girls from violence and victimization in school; (2) proactive discussions in schools about healthy intimate relationships; (3) strong student-teacher relationships; (4) school-based wraparound services; (5) an increased focus on student learning coupled with a reduced emphasis on discipline and surveillance; and (6) consistent school credit recovery processes between alternative schools and traditional district or community schools.

Imagine a future for Black girls that is filled with dignity and where their learning spaces are places they are invited to critically engage, alongside educators, in the construction of their education and in the redemption of their lives. Imagine a Black female student identity that is not marred by stereotypes, but rather is buoyed by a collective vision of excellence that should always accompany the learning identities of our girls.

When we take education away from them, Black girls are exposed to more violence, and they are more likely to be victimized and exploited, to become incarcerated, and to experience a lack of opportunity overall. When we prioritize discipline over learning in our educational institutions, we engage in a reactive politics that maintains a status quo of inequality.

Black girls need teachers, administrators, and school policies that do not see their Black identity as inferior or something to fear. Their Black femininity must not be exploited, ignored, and punished. Their words need not be seen as problematic, and their questions need not be seen as inherently defiant.

When Nancy, a teacher from California, stated that in order to prevent school-to-confinement pathways she must “teach more than the curriculum,” she was putting forth a call for educators to see beyond the perceived attitude and the stereotypes that render too many of our girls invisible or unsuitable for the classroom. She was calling for a community response and an unapologetic rejection of the notion

Being more inclusive would save us from a lot of head-scratching about why it is so hard to break harmful cycles, the negative patterns in student outcomes, and contact with the criminal legal system.

crop tops, or pink extensions in their braids. The crisis of criminalization in schools is an opportunity to focus on the policies, systems, and institutions—in other words, the structures—

1. What assumptions are being made about the conditions of Black girls? 2. How might Black girls be uniquely impacted by school and other disciplinary policies? 3. How are organizations, systems, and policies creating an environment that is conducive or not conducive to the healthy development of Black girls?

Teachers need the opportunity to unpack their own unconscious decision-making processes and co-construct tools to help them better respond to students in crisis. Teachers in low-performing schools are subjected to a high degree of stress associated with inadequate resources, pressures to teach to standardized tests, and fluctuations in student attendance, skill sets, and wellness.

Understand and Examine the Impact of Dress Codes Dress code policies must be revised and new ways of regulating student behavior developed that do not unfairly target Black girls or facilitate their objectification. Dress code policies are designed to encourage respectful student

many Black girls perceive these codes to affect them differently because of subjective enforcement and/or assumptions made about their sexuality.

Treating a girl’s ideas or “smart mouth” as violent when they are reflective of her critical thinking is outside the parameters of being trauma-informed. It is worth noting that community-based organizations are increasingly embracing a healing-informed approach that positively flips the trauma frame, focusing on the journey toward healing rather than on past experiences of trauma.

Only when we develop a national, fully funded investment in all of our young people will we finally breathe life into Maya Angelou’s simple phrase: “Equality, and I will be free.”

For the Black girls we’ve met on these pages, the majority of whom live in poverty and under the normalized surveillance of law enforcement in their communities and schools, these socially reproductive structures constitute educational experiences that guide them to, rather than direct them away from, destitution and escalating contact with the criminal legal system.

They must be allowed to ask questions, to respectfully offer their opinion (even if it differs from the instructor’s opinion), and to learn through an extended epistemology that honors their multiple ways of knowing and learning. Stripping Black girls of the ability

For example, Mia believed that educators could establish a better climate for learning by releasing some of their fear. “The teachers . . . I want them to stop being scared,” Mia said. “They just so scared. . . . Y’all so afraid to just send us out of class, y’all just letting us get away with hella shit. If y’all not going to send us out of class, y’all just letting us get away with anything.” It’s telling that Mia has been socialized to see being pushed out as the only option for dealing with challenging classroom situations. What she is really asking for is an effective, supportive space to learn.

For example, Faith said, “You know how they be having computer classes? They should have a class on jobs and stuff. Research on jobs, like what job you want to do. Like they should research it with you and help you, you know?”

Girls also suggested that the instructors for these courses should possess knowledge of “street” culture and be willing to share information about how to overcome the common obstacles (poverty, parental drug addiction, etc.) that they have found overwhelming in their own lives.