10 OctOber 24 - 30, 2024 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER Classified | MusiC | dish | Culture | unfair Park | Contents cess of reset centers, stating that more kids are spending more time in the classroom and habitual infractions have decreased since the reset centers were implemented. The program is on par with the nuanced ap- proach to student discipline that Rege advo- cates. She urges schools to consider weaving “learning moments” into fair and equitable consequences when students misbehave in- stead of removing the child from class. Stu- dents who engage in a physical fight would write essays on conflict resolution; children who regularly disrupt class would meet with a trusted adult to talk about their compul- sive feelings. The question is, with the burden placed on educators’ shoulders already growing with each school year, and teachers like Kramer who say they have been left to han- dle behavior on their own, is Rege’s ap- proach a realistic one? Ideally, Rege said, schools would work to fill as many mental health-related roles each year, creating a robust team of pro- fessionals skilled in adolescent behaviors tasked with handling discipline for the en- tire student body. She recognizes that dis- tricts are “strapped,” however, making hiring unfeasible for many. Unfunded state mandates are further ex- acerbating already taut district budgets, and state laws passed in the name of school safety — a topic intrinsically connected to student discipline — are often reactionary, placing more burdens on schools in an effort to curb tragedies, Rege said. In 2018, after school shootings in Texas and Florida, Gov. Greg Abbott introduced a school safety plan that proposed, among other things, widen- ing the list of behaviors that warrant out-of- school suspension. The plan was not enacted, but the fol- lowing year “behavioral threat assess- ments,” which schools fill out to identify students who may be exhibiting violent or problematic behaviors, were introduced. In response to the Uvalde mass shooting, law- makers passed an unfunded mandate that requires the hiring of an armed officer at every school in the state. Staffing chal- lenges and funding deficits have left many districts, including Dallas ISD, struggling to comply. At worst, the laws criminalize minors. Some school districts “overcorrect” in the months after a tragedy, Rege said, and the result can be “very damaging” to the future of a child who may not be old enough to fully understand what they said or posted online. Since the September shooting at a high school in Georgia, an “increasing” number of Texas students, some as young as 10 years old, have been flagged by schools for making a terroristic threat, a felony charge, she said. At best, Rege added, these mandates are a misappropriation of resources that school districts badly need to handle disciplinary issues in a more equitable way. “More officers with more guns, unfortu- nately, does not prevent these things from happening. So we are misdirecting our re- sources towards a solution that’s very ex- pensive and not useful,” Rege said. “Therefore, there is no money left for the supportive staff that actually talk with kids [who are having discipline issues] and find out what problems they’re having and help them come up with solutions. Those are the people that we really need, and that’s what we really should be spending our money on.” Boats Against the Current D espite the state legislature’s past inter- est in funding adolescent mental health initiatives and school safety mandates, school vouchers are likely to be the star of the upcoming legislative session. Edu- cation advocates warn that school vouchers — an initiative Abbott is “certain” will be passed in the next session — will siphon more money away from public school districts. As she addressed the media, Rogers voiced a frustration she shares with many educators over the state’s underfunding of public schools. Stoic, she described strug- gles with student discipline and teacher re- tention as “the collateral damage of Governor Abbott’s choices.” “When schools are underfunded, all stake- holders suffer,” Rogers said. “I have been in education for 30 years and I am a proud prod- uct of public schools. I believe in public school education, but what happened to me should never happen to another educator.” Rogers’ decision to come forward about her experience was an uncommon one. Educators are generally one of the most difficult groups to speak with on the re- cord. Most districts implement policies prohibiting media interviews, and recent public attacks on teachers make most hes- itate to be named. For this story, the Observer reached out to eight North Texas educators who had voiced frustration with student behaviors over public social media posts. Only one agreed to speak on the record. Educators are often “afraid what would happen to them” if they do not speak about their “classrooms in a positive way,” Honea said. “[Teaching is] so important and getting more important. The ability of people to be persuaded by disinformation is terrifying to me right now,” Kramer said. “And the only solution to that is education. I think that’s going to save the world.” ▼ COURTS BEYOND ROE V. WADE IMPACTFUL SUPREME COURT CASES FROM NORTH TEXAS. BY GARRETT GRAVLEY T he Supreme Court began its 2024–25 term earlier this month, and on the docket are some sure-to-be major de- cisions, including those on gender-affirming care and the death penalty. But more pertinent to Texas is Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton, which will ad- dress whether our attorney general’s en- forcement of House Bill 1181 (the “anti-porn bill”) violates the First Amendment. This case will expound on prior precedent set in landmark cases like 1997’s Reno v. ACLU, in which a federal law prohibiting online transmission of “indecent” communications to minors was struck down on First Amend- ment grounds. The Paxton case is poised to be a signifi- cant First Amendment case taught in Ameri- can law schools moving forward, since the degree of pornography’s precise legal pro- tections in the Internet age is still being de- termined. (Non-child pornography is generally protected by the First Amend- ment, but regulations on the porn industry have often passed constitutional muster.) This, of course, is far from the first time our area has been at the forefront of signifi- cant Supreme Court battles. Below are five landmark cases that originated in North Texas. Roe v. Wade (1973) Henry Wade was the Dallas County Dis- trict Attorney from 1951 to 1987. Along with the prosecution of Jack Ruby following his murder of Lee Harvey Oswald, this seminal case has come to define Wade’s legacy in Dallas. Abortion was outlawed in almost all cases in Texas, although there was an excep- tion for medical necessity to save the mother or child’s life. A woman we now know to be named Norma McCorvey wanted to circum- vent this prohibition, and simultaneously, lawyers Sarah Weddington and Linda Cof- fee wanted to challenge this prohibition. So they had recurring meetings at a Dallas piz- zeria named Columbo’s Pizza Parlor, which stood at 5734 E. Mockingbird Lane (today, a Walgreen’s and Take 5 Oil Change both oc- cupy that space). Strategic litigation soon followed, and on January 22, 1973, the Supreme Court issued its 7-2 decision: the fundamental right to privacy under the Fourteenth Amendment’s due process clause meant that this Texas law was unconstitutional. Before the Supreme Court overturned this historic decision in 2022’s Dobbs v. Jack- son Women’s Health, McCorvey led a fruitful career as an anti-abortion activist. However, she eventually claimed that “it was all an act.” In the 2020 FX television movie AKA Jane Roe, McCorvey, who died in 2017, is shown saying, “I took their money, and they put me out in front of the camera and told me what to say, and that’s what I’d say.” Texas v. Johnson (1989) In 1984, the Republican National Conven- tion took place in Dallas, and the usual pro- tests came with it. One of these demonstrations was called the “Republican War Chest Tour,” and among its participants was a Marxist named Gregory Lee Johnson. Outside of Dallas City Hall, Johnson poured kerosene on an Amer- ican flag, burned it and chanted, “America, the red, white, and blue, we spit on you.” Johnson was arrested for this demonstra- tion under a Texas law that prohibited dese- cration of the American flag. In a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court declared this arrest unconstitutional. Said Justice William J. Brennan, Jr. in the opinion: “We do not consecrate the flag by punishing its desecration, for in doing so we dilute the freedom that this cherished em- blem represents.” Regardless, former President Donald Trump said in a July 2024 interview with Fox & Friends, “I think you should get a one- year jail sentence if you do anything to dese- crate the American flag. Now, people will say, ‘Oh, it’s unconstitutional.’ Those are stu- pid people.” Estelle v. Gamble (1976) The Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment became more difficult to litigate because of this decision. In 1973, J.W. Gamble of Dallas was con- victed by a Dallas County jury for the mur- der of his wife, Georgia Gamble, in the couple’s Cedar Crest home. Later that year, while Gamble and other prisoners were un- loading cotton bales from a truck as part of their prison labor, a bale fell on him, result- ing in back injuries. Although his back pain and a preexisting hernia were initially treated by medical professionals in the pris- on’s infirmary, the back pain persisted even as he was deemed capable of working. When Gamble complained about his inju- ries to prison officials, he was disciplined for refusal to work. In this case, the Supreme Court found that an Eighth Amendment violation was not proven. From then on, plaintiffs suing for such violations had to prove “deliberate indifference” of medical problems rising to the level of “unnecessary and wan- Mark Graham Yesenia Serrano said North Boulevard Terrace neighbors will not be taking their yard signs down, even though Christian Chernock has withdrawn his zoning cases. Unfair Park from p8 >> p14
