College Perp | EduShyster

College Perp | EduShyster:

College Perp

 Is harsh discipline really the best way to prepare low-income minority students for college?

Quick reader: what is the best way to prepare low-income minority students for college and 21st-century success? If you answered *an obsessive focus on the students’ smallest behaviors (particularly infractions of the uniform variety) paired with plenty of harsh discipline for disciplinary infractions* you are in excellent company. In fact, almost everyone who is anyone these days is in near uniform agreement that harsh punishment today is a recipe for 21st century success tomorrow. Well, not everyone. A group of New Orleans parents recently filed suit, claiming that a *demeaning culture of discipline* at three of the city’s charter schools, including Sci Academy, considered a model charter for New Orleans and beyond, violates the civil rights of students. 

Rights and wrongs 
The parents’ complaint, filed with US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, the US Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights and the Louisiana Recovery District and others, raises a thicket of thorny questions—like, whether or not students attending privately-run charter schools even have civil rights. Or why sky-high suspension rates are apparently A-ok when done in the name of college prep. The three Collegiate Academy College Perp | EduShyster: