| SCSJ Digest | The Monthly Newsletter of SCSJ's Top News |
| Welcome to SCSJ Digest, the monthly newsletter of the Southern Coalition for Social Justice! At the beginning of every month, we'll send you a roundup of the top stories from the previous month, along with relevant updates, e.g., key resources, upcoming events, and noteworthy projects. If you have any recommendations on additional topics you want to read about, please let us know. We hope you enjoy this newsletter! |
| IN THIS ISSUE
Letter from the Executive Directors
Updates
Partner Profile
Student Showcase
Events in April
Top Stories in March 2021 |
| Letter from the Executive Directors | From Allison Riggs and Ryan Roberson |
| Spring has officially begun, and the new season ushers in a sense of hope and resilience as more Americans continue to get vaccinated against COVID-19. Yet with the promise of restored hope comes a sense of continued despair and tragedy, as we all learned about the brazen shootings of 10 people in Boulder, Colorado on March 22 and eight people—six of whom were women of Asian descent—in Georgia on March 16. These senseless acts of hatred and violence result when racism and misogyny intersect, and unfortunately, we have seen it occur all too often. We offer our deepest sympathies to the families who lost loved ones in recent weeks, and we stand even more resolute to fight for our democratic values of equality, liberty, and justice.
In other news, we are pleased to announce that our 2019-20 Racial Equity Report Cards (RERCs) are now available online! With the help of our partner Red Hat, we've launched a more user-friendly, easily digestible overview of the RERCs that viewers can access.
The RERCs use public data to provide a snapshot of a community’s school-to-prison pipeline, including any racial disproportionalities that exist in the pipeline. There is a Report Card for each of the state’s 115 school districts and one for our home state of North Carolina as a whole.
This year’s report cards primarily use 2019-2020 academic year data, which is limited due to the impact COVID-19 had on schools and students. For example, North Carolina did not release data on end-of-grade and end-of-course tests at the end of the 2019-2020 school year, so this data is not available for inclusion in this year’s report cards.
Key findings of the 2019-2020 North Carolina RERC include:
• Black students were 3.9 times more likely than white students to receive a short-term suspension.
• Statewide, 29.9% of all juvenile referrals to the criminal justice system came from schools, down significantly from 45.1% in the 2018-2019 RERC. However, Black students remain disproportionately impacted, accounting for 49.0% of all incidents being referred to the criminal justice system compared to 35.2% among white students.
• While 54.5% of students in North Carolina schools are people of color, only 23% of teachers are. Having a diverse school staff is one way to help equalize opportunities for students of color.
• Latinx students are the least likely to graduate from high school in four years, with statewide graduation rates of 81.7%. In comparison, 90.8% of white students graduate in four years.
Read more about the most-recent RERCs on our website, and take a look at the image below.
Finally, we're taking a brief hiatus with our monthly newsletter and will be back later this spring or early summer. Stay tuned!
In Solidarity,
Allison Riggs and Ryan Roberson
Co-Executive Directors |
| Updates | Key resources, noteworthy projects, etc. |
| Racial Equity Report Cards
“The changes of the past year have significantly increased attention on how safe students are in the classroom. But as school districts work to ensure students are physically safe in schools amid COVID-19 concerns, they also need to take action to protect students from the harms of institutional inequity and racism,” said Tyler Whittenberg, SCSJ's Chief Counsel for Justice System Reform. “As indicated by the 2019-2020 RERCs, much work still needs to be done, including reducing the use of exclusionary discipline and limiting the number of students who enter the justice system via the classroom – two practices that disproportionately and detrimentally impact students of color throughout North Carolina.” |
| | Partner Profile | Monthly feature of our partners' work |
| ACLU of North Carolina
Founded in 1965, the ACLU of North Carolina, an affiliate of the national American Civil Liberties Union, is a private, nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that stands as the state’s guardian of liberty – working in courts, the General Assembly, and communities to protect and advance civil rights and civil liberties for all North Carolinians.
The ACLU of North Carolina brings together litigation, legislative advocacy, communications, and organizing strategies to empower communities and achieve their objectives in major issue areas including criminal law reform, racial justice, LGBTQ equality, reproductive freedom, and the rights of immigrants.
Recently, the ACLU of North Carolina achieved a landmark settlement that will lead to the release of 3,500 people from NC prisons; secured more comprehensive screening and treatment for Hepatitis C for people incarcerated in North Carolina; and are part of a newly formed immigrants’ rights coalition challenging anti-immigrant proposals at the General Assembly.
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| Student Showcase | Resources created by SCSJ's student volunteers and interns |
| Our NC State University student and Creative Intern, Sarah Curry, continues to create beautiful designs that we feature on our social media channels. Take a look at some of her work below! |
| | Events in April | Follow us on social media to stay up to date and register! |
| Thursday, 4/22: Ella Baker Panel
Featuring: Tyler Whittenberg
Tuesday, 4/27 - Thursday, 4/29: South Carolina CROWD Academy
State Partners: SC Appleseed Legal Justice Center and SC Counts
Thursday, 4/29: Lawyers Weekly Diversity & Inclusion Virtual Awards Ceremony
Featuring: Ryan Roberson and Allison Riggs |
| | | | | | 100 voices tell us what future of police should be | Published Mar 23, 2021 by Jeff Schwaner, Staunton News Leader Crime touches millions of Americans every year. What affects more people? Police behavior. Countless daily moments of interaction, personal and impersonal, determine whether a person trusts or distrusts the police. And in hundreds of cases a year, that determines whether a person lives or dies. |
| | | N.C. Court to Decide if Voter Defamation Lawsuit Can Proceed | Published Mar 24, 2021 by BRYAN ANDERSON RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A North Carolina appeals court panel will soon decide whether a libel complaint can proceed to trial over false accusations that representatives of former Gov. Pat McCrory made in 2016 alleging several voters had unlawfully cast multiple ballots, were ineligible due to a felony conviction or voted in the name of dead people. |
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