On Wednesday, June 30, 2021, I was honored to represent APA and Div. 37 in a congressional briefing in support of the Protecting Our Students in Schools Act. This bill, which was co-sponsored by Rep. Donald McEachin (VA) and Rep. Suzanne Bonamici (OR) in the House and Sen. Christopher Murphy (CT) in the Senate, would require states to ban corporal punishment from public schools in order to receive federal education funding. My role in the briefing was to report on data on the prevalence and disproportionate use of school corporal punishment as well as to summarize research on the harms linked to corporal punishment. I was joined on the panel by community advocates from Mississippi and Texas, the head of the Mississippi teacher’s union, a historian who pointed to links between the use of wooden paddles in schools and their use on enslaved persons, and a medical expert who spoke about the physical trauma that results from school corporal punishment. The briefing was well-attended, with 100 participants via a Zoom webinar format.
Mel Schneiderman (Div. 37’s member-at-large for advocacy) and I participated in months of meetings to plan this briefing with several partners, namely the Education Trust, the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Intercultural Development Research Association, and the Nollie Jenkins Family Center. Our Division’s role in this briefing was in part a fulfillment of our leadership of a consortium of nine APA divisions (7, 9, 16, 31, 33, 37, 53, 54, and 56) that received a grant from APA’s Committee on Division/APA Relations (CODAPAR) to support advocacy for federal legislation banning school corporal punishment and for other interventions designed to reduce violence against children.
The bill has been endorsed by dozens of organizations, including APAopens in new window. The Executive Board of Div. 37 also voted to endorse the bill. I am especially proud that several of the APA Divisions who are part of our CODAPAR consortium endorsed the bill, namely:
- Div. 53 (Society of Clinical and Adolescent Psychology)
- Div. 54 (Society of Pediatric Psychology)
- several constituent members of Div. 31 (State, Provincial and Territorial Association Affairs):
- Connecticut Psychological Association
- Florida Psychological Association
- Georgia Psychological Association
- Kentucky Psychological Association
- Maine Psychological Association
- Michigan Psychological Association
- Minnesota Psychological Association
- Missouri Psychological Association
- Pennsylvania Psychological Association
I also worked with APA to create this fact sheet on school corporal punishmentopens in new window to educate lawmakers about the disproportionate use of corporal punishment against boys, Black students, and students with disabilities, and about the harms caused by school corporal punishment. Please feel free to circulate it to your colleagues and forward to your members of Congress.
Mel and I will continue to monitor the progress of the bill and will alert our division membership for any additional opportunities to get involved.