NEW LEGAL THEORIES SET OUT TO SHOW THAT TRAUMA IS A PUBLIC HEALTH EMERGENCY IN SCHOOLS
By Tashiana Stafford with data visualizations by Erica Knox
Scientists, therapists, and social workers have long connected the lingering effects of trauma to severe and long-lasting health problems. Now, new legal theories are testing the relationship between student trauma and required educational accommodations, with the potential to provide unprecedented levels of support to impacted youth.
It is no secret that, in Chicago, the effects of gun violence are concentrated predominately in communities of color [1]. High levels of racial and economic segregation in Chicago have magnified the effects of gun violence in majority Black and Brown neighborhoods. Moreover, it is the youth of Chicago who are disproportionately affected by the trauma that this gun violence induces. According to an analysis released by the Erickson Institute last July, 60 percent of children up to five years old live in neighborhoods where 91 percent of the city’s homicides occurred in 2018. With Black and Brown students comprising roughly 83 percent of all students in Chicago Public Schools (CPS), gun violence should be a core racial equity concern of CPS.
While the number of shootings per year in Chicago has decreased over the last few years, the residual effects of the violence still permeate neighborhood streets. A shooting traumatizes those who are directly involved and it reverberates throughout the whole community, whether they knew the people involved or because they experience fear for their own safety. Like an earthquake, a shooting leaves damage far beyond its epicenter. For students in low-income neighborhoods, these traumas are only part of the difficult challenges, including homelessness and food insecurity, that can erect barriers to their education.
“The vast majority of [Chicago Public School] students have been exposed to gun violence in their communities, if not within their own families and friends. So the toll that it takes on children in Chicago is pretty tremendous.”
— REBECCA LEVIN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF STRENGTHENING CHICAGO’S YOUTH (SCY)
When this many students are dealing with the effects of trauma in a school system, it is no longer a social issue but a public health emergency. The law has the ability to create change. In California, a group of suspended and expelled students and teachers at Compton Unified School District filed a lawsuit to have trauma recognized in the definition of “cognizable disability” in federal disability laws. This recognition could grant students access to trauma supports [2]. The students argued that the district was failing to accommodate them because although the district had notice of the community violence, it still implemented certain policies that re-triggered the students’ trauma-induced disabilities [3].
Peter P. v. Compton Unified School District is a significant case. In denying the school district’s motion to dismiss the students’ case, the judge acknowledged that exposure to traumatic events may actually cause physical or mental impairments that could be cognizable as disabilities under the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”) and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act (“Section 504”)[3]. Acknowledging that severe or chronic trauma could possibly result from living in areas with high gun violence, the judge wrote that responses like “flight or flight” and detached or dissociative states can become the brain’s new equilibrium [4]. Finally, the law is beginning to recognize what researchers and educators have known for a long time: that childhood traumatic stress can have dire impacts on a student’s ability to succeed and can have long-term effects on brain development.
“The aggregated impacts of a starkly segregated city, the high rates of poverty and violence in Chicago communities and the challenges facing the school system strongly suggest that many Chicago youth regularly or persistently experience some form of trauma.”
— EDUCATORS FOR EXCELLENCE 2017 REPORT [5]
As cases like Compton make their way through the courts, Illinois schools should assess how to implement trauma supports without the pressure of a lawsuit. CPS has already taken some steps to do so and to raise awareness about these issues. For example, CPS CEO Janice Jackson spoke in September at a U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee hearing to call for additional federal resources for local programming that helps student process and heal from violence. Other schools around the state have started to implement their own programs as well. Time is of the essence; every day, students are missing critical learning accommodations.
Dion McGill, Communications and Community Outreach manager of Strengthening Chicago’s Youth at Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, says it best: “I was told by someone much smarter than I that one of the best ways to deal with trauma is through action.” In Illinois, we must insist that action comes sooner rather than later.
Tashiana Stafford is a Legal Fellow with Chicago Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights working on education equity issues. A recent graduate of Notre Dame Law School, Tashiana serves as an advocate for policies to ensure services for school-aged children in Chicago that suffer from gun violence-induced trauma.
CITATIONS
[1] Ezell v. City of Chicago, 651 F. 3d 684,715 (7th Cir. 2011) (“The City [of Chicago] has legitimate, indeed overwhelming, concerns about the prevalence of gun violence within City limits”).
[2] Peter P. v. Compton Unified School District , 135 F. Supp. 3d 1098 (C.D. Cal 2015)(“Peter P. v. Compton”)
[3] Id. at 554 citing Peter P. v. Compton Unified School District at 1103
[4] Peter P. v. Compton Complaint at 116
[5] Sounding the Alarm: Building the Climate & Culture Our Students Need, Educators for Excellence Chicago (June 2017) at https://e4e.org/what-we-do/policy-solutions/sounding-alarm