Portland Public Schools will be working with the Portland Education Association, the district’s teachers’ union, to form a task force aimed at creating a “progressive” student discipline policy, officials agreed at meeting earlier this week.
Portland Education Association President Kerrie Dowdy described the union’s proposed initiative at a Tuesday evening business meeting of Portland Board of Public Education.
“The Portland Education Association has proposed to the superintendent a task force to review Portland Public School student discipline policies and procedures, and to develop a draft proposal of a progressive discipline document for Portland Public School students by the first school board meeting in May.
Dowdy said that drafting a districtwide progressive discipline protocol for students has been “widely requested” since she began teaching in Portland in 1992.
“This is not only to advocate for all students and staff in the Portland Public Schools, but also to advocate for parents, as embedding parent collaboration into this process is critical for student success,” Dowdy said.
The teachers’ union president described several “anchor points” that they would be looking to incorporate into the progressive discipline policy, including developing protocols for what student information can be shared with school staff, the handling of a “dangerous incident occurring at an off-site event” or outside of school hours, and a shared understanding of Maine’s dangerous behavior state law.
Portland Superintendent Ryan Scallon expressed his support for the union’s proposal and said the district would be moving forward with forming the task force.
Scallon said the task force will be examining “what’s the best structure to look at creating structure and support for students that not only includes restorative justice, and ways to recognize that part of work as educators is to recognize that students are learning and growing with us.”
“Part of that is about making sure they have safe spaces to make mistakes to learn from, and to come back to the community, and to have ways to heal the community,” Scallon said. “But also that we need to have clear expectations for students and for staff to respond to students who need redirection when in the school environment.”
The superintendent added that a goal of the task force will be to make sure the district is clear on expectations around student behavior, but will also be focused on “how do we respond and how do we support in a caring and progressive way.”
“I believe that making sure that we’re really clear on this and upfront and transparent about this is part of the key way that we ensure that our schools embody what we about in our mission statement about making sure that we have joyful places for students to learn,” Scallon said.
“I believe that sometimes discipline or structure becomes a negative, or is viewed that way, and this is about creating structure and clear expectations,” he said.
The Portland school district recently had to contend with a violent incident from last October involving Jemal Murph, the Lincoln Middle School Athletic Director.
Murph had been accused of punching a student near Dougherty Field at an after-school soccer game, after telling several students to disperse from the area.
The incident, captured on cell phone video, shows several students pushing and shoving Murph, who retaliated with a punch to the student who knocked him down.
Video of the incident below from WGME:
An executive session of the school board, in which they would have voted on whether or not to fire Murph, was canceled after the board and the teachers’ union reached an agreement, and the matter was dismissed.
At a January meeting, Portland school board Chair Sarah Lentz admitted that “student behaviors have been increasing and escalating,” and that educators may be feeling unsafe or have “confusion about how traditional discipline practices and restorative justice and other techniques coexist.”
Earlier this month, a parent of two elementary school children in Portland schools addressed the school board regarding frequent behavioral issues by students in the classroom that have resulted in evacuations, and that teachers have to spend more time with multilingual learners.
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