PERSPECTIVE ON VIOLENCE : ‘Heartware,’ Not Hardware : Education in the skills of nonviolence, not the reactionary response of more policing, is the answer for our schools.

The tragic death of a Dorsey High School student this week will bring another public outcry about the climate of violence that has led so many young people to bring weapons to school. Unfortunately, society’s desperation usually leads to an equally desperate and, in my opinion, inappropriate response. We are reminded that, after the fatal shooting of two students at a Brooklyn high school last month, Mayor David Dinkins ordered that $28 million be spent on school metal detectors.

In my 30 years of working in inner-city schools, I have witnessed a decline in student behavior that mirrors the rise of violence in society--the increase in violent assaults on campus, gang involvement, drug use, sexual activity, suicide and other acts that, besides bringing great harm to those involved, leave others in the school community feeling helpless, powerless, even more disadvantaged than before.

Typically, the schools’ response is greater reliance on the police and other campus security agencies. I propose that educators give education a chance: that we teach values and respect for human life through a comprehensive school-based program centered on a nonviolence curriculum at all grade levels. Some of the key ingredients would be:

-- Parent involvement. Parent centers at every school should be a budgeted priority. These centers would be staffed by parent workers who would coordinate all parent volunteer activities on a daily basis, including supervision, class visitations, phone calls to other parents and support for teachers and staff. Parents walking the halls of schools daily are more effective than police officers in creating a nurturing and “student-friendly” atmosphere.

In this regard, parents should be informed about, and encouraged to use, a law that allows them to request paid time off from work, of up to four hours a year per child, to visit school during school hours. This law, sponsored by Assemblyman Curtis Tucker Jr. (D-Inglewood), has been in effect for a year, but most parents are not aware of their right, and few schools promote it.

-- Curriculum. A nonviolence curriculum should be made mandatory in all California schools in order to prepare our children to live in a multiethnic, multicultural and economically disparate society. Students can be taught to recognize the systemic and personal behaviors that create conflict, hatred, oppression, racism, sexism, classism, poverty and other conditions that generate violent responses. Conflict resolution should be taught at all grade levels.

--Peer counseling and community service. This should be mandatory, particularly for Grades 7-12. Teams of peer counselors trained in conflict resolution, nurturing and peer support activities would be as active as athletic teams and as aggressive as middle linebackers in rescuing potential dropouts and other at-risk students. The celebration of saved lives is more significant than any athletic awards banquet. Community-service projects should be required of all student clubs and athletic teams.

--Anti-gang education. Programs in this aspect of nonviolence, particularly designed to address the needs of young men, must be implemented no later than Grade 4. Most negative, violent and gang-related activity in our society is initiated by males, with vulnerable females participating as supporters and ultimate victims. Male mentors must be actively recruited to serve as role models for male students. The absence of fathers in so many homes is self-generating and will continue to expand unless an educational approach is adopted that specifically addresses young men. And it must be unapologetic in the face of resistance from other segments of the community who may be unnerved by the concept of a unified minority male agenda that seeks salvation through cooperation rather than competition.

As an educator, I call upon my colleagues to demand an educational solution rather than the reactionary response of demanding expanded law enforcement. Our state Education Code, like all others in the country, does not address the concept of love as a required behavior on the part of educators. While demanding increased salaries and decision-making authority, we have forgotten our professional and ethical commitment to behave differently and effectively in response to the needs of disadvantaged children. We can no longer label the victims as “at-risk youth” and “dropouts” when we may be guilty of generating a risk-enhancing environment with “push-out” behaviors.

The home-school relationship, too, must be expanded. It can no longer be narrowly defined by a handful of parents assisting the school through PTA, advisory council and booster club activities. Ideally, a parent would be present in every classroom every day, observing the educational process. We educators must encourage parents’ presence or it will never occur. Too often I have heard my colleagues protest the presence of “too many” parents; apparently, many of us feel intimidated by the thought of them observing our teaching on a daily basis. Yet excellence has nothing to fear from observation. We should reject our fear and move bravely into the 21st Century before it is too late. Individual acts of heroism on the part of a few heroic teachers are insufficient to institutionalize excellence; our thrust must be designed to change our collective behavior as educators. When the community responds to problems of violence with demands for metal-detectors at schools, or more patrol cars or other enforcement hardware, we must respond with “heartware”; the educational community must respond as educators.