Legal implications of profiling students for violence

Abstract

Predicting violent activity with a youth violence profile in schools raises a host of legal concerns focusing on the validity and use of profiles as social science evidence: the impact of potential discrimination, search and seizure, and the implications for privacy. Schools differ from airports or other settings where profiles are used. Profiles are useful if they properly establish reasonable suspicion to stop an individual. They raise more problematic constitutional issues when they support referring a student to alternative educational services. Where a profile identifies students based on race, gender, or proxies for these characteristics, it is invalid. It can also be invalid if it is not a reasonable method of achieving the government's interest in safe schools. In addition, profiles present significant problems for confidentiality. These issues rest on fundamental concerns about the general validity of profiles as scientific tools: their objectivity, accuracy, sensitivity, overinclusiveness, and general scientific acceptance. Consequently, the use of profiles in a school setting is highly problematic and controversial.

Antisocial behavior and the prediction of violence: A meta‐analysis

“…Individuals engaging in these activities are sometimes subject to school sanctions such as suspension, and many of these behaviors are subject to legal prosecution and punishable under the law (see Bailey, 2001). Given the potential seriousness of being identified on either the predictor or the outcome in this set of relationships, it is perhaps appropriate to frame the concern with identification around the idea of reducing error.…”

Student Alienation Syndrome: A Paradigm for Understanding the Relation Between School Trauma and School Violence

“…Hyman and Snook (1999) described in great detail how some schools have adhered to punitive disciplinary practices that may cause severe damage to the mental health of a child. School policies such as strip searches, random urine testing, and censorship violate a child's civil rights protected under state and federal law (Bailey, 2001). In addition, Hyman and Snook outlined (1999) various school practices that are not only unproductive and psychologically harmful, but are also infringements of children's civil liberties.…”