Spanking in School
Nineteen US states still allow public school staff to strike students with wooden boards. These states are: Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Wyoming. This happens even in schools with zero-tolerance policies for violence. Each year, at least 166,000 children are struck by public school faculty. This number increases when students attending private schools are considered.
For information on each state's laws on school corporal punishment, please click here.
12 Things to Know About Corporal Punishment in U.S. Public Schools
1.Only 2 of the 24 major industrialized countries still allow school corporal punishment. The U.S. is one of them.
2. Corporal punishment is still legal in public schools in 19 U.S. states.
3. School corporal punishment is typically administered with a wooden paddle two feet long, four inches wide, and half an inch thick.
4. In the 2011-2012 school year, a total of 163,333 children, from preschool through 12th grade, were subjected to corporal punishment in their public schools.
5. Boys, Black students, and students with disabilities are disproportionately corporally punished.
6. Ironically, the most common reasons for school corporal punishment are fighting, aggression, and disruptive behavior.
7. The majority of Americans (77%) oppose school corporal punishment.
8. Many professional organizations oppose school corporal punishment
9. States that have banned school corporal punishment have not seen an increase in juvenile crime.
10. Where school corporal punishment is legal, teachers are allowed to use a level of violence that would be considered physical abuse if done by a parent.
11. There are many effective ways of teaching students of all ages without ever hitting them.
12. Children are the only US citizens who can be legally hit.
The Board Of Education. A Documentary About Corporal Punishment In US Public Schools:
Donald E. Greydanus, MD, Pediatrics Program Director at the Kalamazoo Center for Medical Studies, testifies at a hearing about Corporal Punishment in Schools and its Effect on Academic Success:
Well-informed Mississippi student activists petition their school board with intelligent and emotional words to end school paddling in their district:
