Examining The Racialized Impact of School Resource Officers

Presenting data-driven research on how SROs have impacted disciplinary rates, including suspensions and expulsions, in schools

by: Meri Kadagize, SESEC Fellow and Master’s Student at the University of Washington College of Education

In the 2023–24 school year, a student’s fatal shooting at Garfield High School reignited calls to bring School Resource Officers back. During an SPS Board Meeting, students, parents, and teachers testified demanding school safety without relying on policing. While stakeholders agree that safety is non-negotiable, a divide remains around how to achieve safety for students. In this blog, we will explore why school resource officers reinforce harmful practices. 

“The deployment of School Resource Officers (SROs) in schools has not been proven to improve safety and instead reinforces a culture of fear and criminalizes everyday student behavior.”

The deployment of School Resource Officers (SROs) blurred the line between school discipline and the criminal justice system. The idea of engaging law enforcement officers with schools is rooted in the zero-tolerance policy, which expanded school discipline beyond serious threats like weapons to include fights, drug possession, and even minor misbehavior. 1 Despite the increasing presence of SROs, there is no consistent evidence that they effectively prevent gun violence.2 Instead, SROs, often armed, reinforce a power dynamic that distances them from students and contributes to a school culture shaped more by surveillance than by support.3

As schools increasingly embed law enforcement into routine discipline, behaviors once handled with a conversation, a call home, or guidance from a counselor are now treated as criminal matters. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, SROs report their daily duties as patrolling school grounds (94%), responding to classroom incidents (91%), making arrests (93.5%), and issuing citations (88%)-tasks that align more with juvenile justice systems than educational support. A major national study offering a comprehensive analysis of SROs found that schools with SROs report more than twice the number of suspensions. Students in these schools are nearly five times more likely to be expelled and four times more likely to be arrested or referred to law enforcement than those in schools without SROs.4

“School safety policies have historically functioned as tools of racial control, resulting in the systematic over-disciplining of Black students and fueling the school-to-prison pipeline. “

The impact of SRO deployment has never been solely about safety or neutrality; it has disproportionately affected students of color, especially Black students and students with disabilities. Since the 1960s, media and government reports have framed Black student activism as violent, using school safety policies as structural tools for monitoring and surveilling Black students’ bodies. The evidence demonstrates that schools with the majority of students of color were more likely to have at least one law enforcement officer than schools serving mostly white students.5 Oppressive structures have also been backed up with implicit racial biases of individual professionals that shape how student behavior is interpreted.6 Because of this, Black students are more frequently perceived as defiant, aggressive, or prone to misbehavior, even when their behavior mirrors that of their white peers.7

National and statewide, as the local trends support that, Black students are more likely to be referred to the office for punishment, suspended, or expelled for the same infractions as white students. Nationwide, Black students and their caretakers are twice as likely to report feeling unsafe at school compared to white peers. Black students face significantly higher rates of disciplinary actions in schools compared to their peers. They are more likely to be suspended, expelled, referred to law enforcement, arrested on campus, and subjected to corporal punishment.8

Figure 1. Disparities in Disciplinary Rates: Black Students vs. White Students.
Analysis based on U.S. Department of Education, Civil Rights Data Collection, School Year 2017–2018; and Lucy C. Sorensen, Montserrat Avila Acosta, John Engberg, and Shawn D. Bushway, The Thin Blue Line in Schools: New Evidence on School-Based Policing Across the U.S. (EdWorkingPaper: 21-476), Annenberg Institute at Brown University, 2021, https://doi.org/10.26300/heqx-rc69.

Washington state data from 2023 aligns with national trend: Black students were nearly twice as likely to be excluded from class for discipline (6.4%). African American children face over-discipline, unfair behavior labels, and special education placements without support. Nearly 29% of caregivers said the school identified their child with a behavior problem, and 46% were unhappy with the school’s handling.9

Seattle Public Schools (SPS) reflects both national and statewide patterns. In July, SPS reported that most schools adopted anti-racist practices; yet, outcomes show limited progress. Since 2019, perceived fair discipline by African American male students in grades 3–12 has increased by only 3%. Overall perceived safety remains at 57%. Black and Hispanic students were disciplined nearly five times more than their white peers. Low-income students and students with disabilities faced exclusion more than twice the district average. Black students had the highest extended suspension rates, with 41.5% excluded over one day, nearly double white students.10

“We must shift from a policing-based model of school safety to one rooted in racial justice, community care, and positive school culture.”

As we navigate these complex issues, it is essential to recognize that the traditional understanding of safety as merely the absence of threat has failed. This narrow view leads to the same solutions-such as policing and exclusion—that have consistently shown little success in preventing violence or improving school climate. Instead, they retraumatize Black students and students with disabilities. In my next blog, I will explore alternative safety paradigms and tools that center racial justice and embrace approaches that prioritize healing, equity, and the lived experiences of students.

Meri Kadagidze is an Education Policy and Advocacy Fellow at SESEC and a Fulbright scholar. She is currently pursuing her master’s degree in Education Leadership and Policy Studies at the University of Washington. Passionate about advancing educational equity and community-driven policy, she is dedicated to creating inclusive, impactful solutions that empower diverse learners and communities.

  1.  Rout, L., Pate, C., Wu, K., & McKenna, J. (2022). Reimagining school safety: A guide
    for schools and communities. [Center to Improve Social and Emotional Learning and School Safety at
    WestEd]. WestEd. ↩︎
  2. Lucy C. Sorensen, Montserrat Avila‑Acosta, John B. Engberg, and Shawn D. Bushway, “The Thin Blue Line in Schools: New Evidence on School‑Based Policing Across the U.S.,” Journal of Policy Analysis and Management 42, no. 4 (September 2023): 941–70, https://doi.org/10.1002/pam.22498. ↩︎
  3.  Losen, D. J., & Martinez, P. (2020). Lost opportunities:
    How disparate school discipline continues to drive differences in the opportunity to learn. Palo Alto,
    CA/Los Angeles, CA: Learning Policy Institute; Center for Civil Rights Remedies at the Civil Rights
    Project, UCLA. ;lmanza, Matthew, Makayla Mason, and Chris Melde, “Perceptions of School Resource Officers: Protectors or Prosecutors?” Criminal Justice Review, Vol. 48, No. 3, 202 ↩︎
  4.  Davis, Elizabeth J., Law Enforcement Agencies That Employ School Resource Officers, 2019, Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, NCJ 305181, November 2022 ↩︎
  5.  Gottfredson, Denise C., Scott Crosse, Zhiqun Tang, Erin L. Bauer, Michele A. Harmon, Carol A. Hagen, and Angela D. Greene, “Effects of School Resource Officers on School Crime and Responses to School Crime,” Criminology and Public Policy, Vol. 19, No. 3, August 2020 ↩︎
  6. Sorensen, Lucy C., Montserrat Avila Acosta, John Engberg, and Shawn D. Bushway. (2021). The Thin Blue Line
    in Schools: New Evidence on School-Based Policing Across the U.S.. (EdWorkingPaper: 21-476). Retrieved from Annenberg
    Institute at Brown University: https://doi.org/10.26300/heqx-rc69 ↩︎
  7.  Staats, Cheryl. Implicit Racial Bias and School Discipline Disparities: Exploring the Connection. Columbus, OH: Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity, The Ohio State University, May 2014. https://kirwaninstitute.osu.edu/sites/default/files/documents/ki-ib-argument-piece03.pdf ↩︎
  8.  Analysis based on U.S. Department of Education, Civil Rights Data Collection, School Year 2017–2018; and Lucy C. Sorensen, Montserrat Avila Acosta, John Engberg, and Shawn D. Bushway, The Thin Blue Line in Schools: New Evidence on School-Based Policing Across the U.S. (EdWorkingPaper: 21-476), Annenberg Institute at Brown University, 2021, https://doi.org/10.26300/heqx-rc69. ↩︎
  9.  Washington State Commission on African American Affairs, A Plan to Close the Opportunity Gap, unpublished manuscript, 2025
    ↩︎
  10.  Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction. (n.d.). Seattle School District No. 1 (District 100229) – Washington State Report Card. Retrieved July 26, 2025, from https://reportcard.ospi.k12.wa.us/ReportCard/ViewSchoolOrDistrict/100229data.wa.gov+10reportcard.ospi.k12.wa.us+10coupeville.k12.wa.us+10 ;] SPS school board meeting, July 12.
    ↩︎