Worcester Co. school leaders push back on claims of increasing student violence

WORCESTER COUNTY, Md. – Worcester County Public Schools (WCPS) and Board of Education (WCBOE) officials are pushing back hard against claims made by law enforcement about school safety earlier this week.

“I was sad, and frankly appalled, to see our elected law enforcement leaders choose to manipulate student referral data in an attempt to say our schools were hotspots for assault,” said WCPS Superintendent Louis Taylor.

WCPS: Data Doesn’t Add Up

WCPS officials said that Worcester County Sheriff Matt Crisafulli and State’s Attorney Kris Heiser’s data, presented on Tuesday, doesn’t add up.

“The data depicted on this chart is not crime, but student disciplinary referrals. A referral is generated when a student is referred to school administration for violating school rules or policies,” Taylor said, referring to the data. “On the other hand, a crime is a violation of the law.”

School leaders do agree that there has been an increase in student incident referrals: a 20% increase referrals for attacks on students, a 42% increase in fighting referrals, a 73% increase in referrals for attacks on staff, and a 7% and 8% increase on verbal threats against students and staff, respectively.

However, WCPS says where the data differs, is the years it was pulled from; school leaders say their data includes the 2018-2019 school year, in addition to the 2022-2023 school year. Law enforcement’s data, however, was only based off of data from the 2019-2020 school year, say WCPS leaders.

Increased Focus on Reporting

Taylor called on Sheriff Crisafulli and Heiser to release the entirety of the raw data to the public.

“We believe that this omitted data tells a very different story; that the safety and disciplinary practices in Worcester County Public Schools are, in fact, proving effective, and reducing student referrals,” Taylor said. “The school system [is] on track to have the lowest referral rate in years.”

WCPS Chief Safety and Academic Officer, Dr. Annette Wallace, offered another reason why those numbers saw an increase; as she took on the role that helps oversee safety in the district, Dr. Wallace says she placed an emphasis on ensuring referral reporting was accurate.

“You can’t address issues if you don’t have good data. We saw some areas of opportunities in our specific schools. We went and had conversations about reporting,” Dr. Wallace said. “I would fully expect that when you increase your expectation for what is being reported, that more would be reported.”

Recommendations Not Spurned, Say Leaders

School officials also responded to claims that recommendations for school safety made by law enforcement were spurned by WCPS. WCBOE President Todd Ferrante says many of those recommended practices already exist in school district policy; those that don’t, he says, were being actively worked on, toward implementation.

Ferrante also spoke about WCPS’ school safety taskforce, which he says has been working for months on these issues. He says the group was making significant progress. “The taskforce met seven times, and spent countless hours evaluating and discussing the State’s Attorney’s and the Sheriff’s concerns,” he said.

The WCBOE was also preparing to make a series of three public presentations on school safety efforts, alongside Sheriff Crisafulli and Heiser, says Ferrante. However, he says, planning of those presentation unraveled after law enforcement suggested including video taken on school grounds of various instances of violence and bullying.

Work Lies Ahead

Dr. Wallace expressed that Sheriff Crisafulli and his office have been “wonderful partners” thus far in addressing and improving safety at WCPS. However, she says, there is much more work to be done.

“What I can assure the public of, is that we are constantly learning every day, and we are refining,” Dr. Wallace said. “One of the best things about school and law enforcement working together, is that we bring diverse perspective to the table. I think [it’s] just continuing to sit down around the table, and having those discussions.”

Law Enforcement Responds

In response to the the press conference held by WCPS, Sheriff Crisafulli and Heiser issued a joint statement.

“The BOE President and Superintendent’s attempt to defend their reputation and minimize the amount of violence in our schools does nothing to reassure the public that they are making safety a priority,” the statement reads in part. “Despite their best efforts to label the Sheriff and State’s Attorney as liars and data-manipulators, their press conference today confirmed the two main points that law enforcement has been making for months: (1) that crime in schools is rising at an unacceptable rate and (2) that none of law enforcement’s recommendations to improve school safety have been implemented by Worcester County Public Schools.”

The statement goes on to call on the BOE and Taylor to “take immediate action on these recommendations to improve safety in our schools.” Heiser and Sheriff Crisafulli also said in their statement that they “remain ready to support, advise and assist school leadership in this mission.”