The legislature of California has started to discuss a new bill that will strip the power from k-12 schools from suspending or expelling children that show up to class drunk and/or high, or those in possession of either alcohol or illicit drugs.
The proposed ban has been fully outlined within Assembly Bill 599 by Democratic Assemblymember Chris Ward. The Education Committee debated then fully approved AB 599 this last week after a unanimous vote which will now send it straight to the Appropriations Committee.
This bill made the argument that students should not fear being suspended or expelled for being either drunk or high because “high feelings of school connectedness can decrease drug use” — including that students should be kept in a school environment, instead of being forced out, as a means to stop additional alcohol and drug use.
Ward marked this bill’s ban as a “public health approach” when considering the language it uses.
This new bill would also force the California Department of Education to build a new model policy as soon as July 1st, 2025 for dealing with students that are found to be in possession of and using illicit drugs while on property owned by the school. a similar policymaking requirement would be imposed on local educational agencies, who would also have to offer up additional resources for the education, treatment, or support for substance abuse.
Ward also altered language in the bill that made reference to “she” or “he” with more gender-neutral terms, such as “the principal” or “the superintendent.”
The state assembly for California chose to advance AB 599 past the Education Committee this past week. At the hearing for the committee, Ward stated that suspensions and expulsions due to substance abuse play a role in reinforcing what they call the school-to-prison pipeline. Ward went on to state that his new bill would end up resulting in a far “more humane” approach to dealing with problem children.
As the chair of the Education Committee and a former school board member, Democratic Assemblyman Al Muratsuchi questioned how to measure the total effectiveness of zero-tolerance policies regarding alcohol and drugs in schools.
Nora Lynn — known as the associate director of a public policy organization that co-authored the bill, Children Now — failed to offer up any specific measurement criteria but made the claim that the results of such a zero-tolerance policy impact heavily outweighed deterrence.
“We would just point to the very strongly disproportionate impacts on youth of color, young boys of color, and we feel like that far outweighs whatever deterrence there may be,” stated Lynn.
A number of other groups also stepped up to co-author the bill: the California Alliance of Child and Family Services (CACFS), California Youth Empowerment Network (CAYEN), and California Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry (CALACAP).
