Baltimore student leaders pledged yesterday to become an army of youthful cops, aiding their teachers and principals in ridding schools of the weapons that have pushed violence to record levels.
About 125 elected student council members from middle and high schools passed a resolution committing their organization, the Associated Student Congress of Baltimore City, to report weapons in school and support legislation that would reduce the flow of weapons. The students also asked fellow students, parents and principals to sign "contracts" agreeing to report and help combat violence.
The fall meeting of the congress came two days after The Sun documented a soaring of violent acts in the schools, including the highest rate of gun incidents in a decade and increasing rates of assaults on both students and staff members. Many of the students said, however, that the news media emphasize violent incidents while failing to report the accomplishments of students, most of whom never engage in violent acts.
"If you read what they say about Patterson, you'd think we were hanging out the windows shooting at everybody," said Domanic Smith, a senior who is president of the Patterson High School student government. "When the news media come out, all they want to see is the negative stuff."
By a show of hands, the students agreed overwhelmingly that violence is a major problem in city schools. By a similar vote, they agreed the schools are not portrayed fairly by the media.
But school administrators and crowded classrooms also came in for criticism. Some of the student leaders said principals are loath to confront incidents of violence so that they can "look good" to their North Avenue bosses and keep dirty linen out of the media. As a result, they said, schools are crowded with troublemakers who make it hard for the majority to learn.
Thomas Bunn, who accompanied his eighth-grade daughter, Myell, to the meeting at Northwestern High School, said violence jTC has subsided in recent years at Garrison Middle School, where two of his children go to school, "but you will always have trouble when you have classrooms with 40 kids in them."
Devlin Sherrod, a senior at Venable Senior High School, was applauded when he said the city, "instead of building more jails, should build more schools."
The congress heard from officials of the district's Safe Schools Office, from a representative of Marylanders Against Handgun Violence and from a school security officer.
A few specific proposals came from the meeting. One student suggested senior high schools "adopt" middle schools, pairing students one-on-one. Another suggested more programs in high schools similar to "big brothers" and "big sisters," in which adults or older students advise younger ones.
Janette Jordan, a senior at City College, said city schools have to address the problems of African-American males specifically. "They're at the root of what's wrong," she said. "We [young black women] have to bear their problems as well as our own."
While the student leaders met in the auditorium of Northwestern, school went on as usual in the 1,300-student school. Principal Mary Brown said she has two unarmed security officers.