Vengeful Equity: Gendering the School-to-Prison Pipeline

Abstract

The ‘school-to prison pipeline’ problem has typically been framed as predominantly affecting boys since punitive school discipline practices become firmly entrenched in U.S. public schools beginning in the 1990’s. Since then, the experiences of girls and gender non-conforming students has largely been overlooked. Girls and gender non-conforming students represent an increasing number of students suspended from schools annually and the number of juvenile justice involved girls has increased. This policy brief presents context to the problem and suggests a gendered analysis of aggression and violence is warranted to identify differences in the ways girls’ and gender non-conforming students’ behaviors are perceived and punished in schools utilizing intersectionality as an analytic tool of critical praxis to provide researchers, policy-makers, and practitioners recommendations for future empirical study and practical approaches to correct policy and practice that perpetuate gender bias and social inequality. Improved policy and practice that address inequitable application of school discipline decision-making and juvenile justice decisions can have a direct effect on girls’ and gender non-conforming students’ academic success and decrease the number of women incarcerated across the United States.