In 1993, the Texas Federation of Teachers (TFT) sent a questionnaire to its members, asking them about their experiences with disruption and violence in their schools. The results were alarming. Undoubtedly, the disorder that teachers reported was the work of a few students, but TFT knew that these kids were harming the learning of all the rest. Without tough codes of conduct that were consistently enforced, they would continue doing so the union also knew that parents and members of the community agreed overwhelmingly on the importance of establishing order in the schools, so TFT launched a campaign calling for zero tolerance for certain kinds of violent and disruptive behavior.

The campaign led ultimately to the passage of the Texas Safe Schools Act in 1995. The legislation requires school districts to remove violent students from regular classrooms and place them in alternative educational settings. It also gives teachers the authority to remove from their class a student who consistently disrupts other students, and it prohibits administrators from automatically returning that student-which was a common practice. These students are generally reassigned to another class. Administrators can appeal a teacher's action to a committee set up for that purpose, so the law strikes a balance between safeguarding the rights of students who are consistently disruptive and the rights of
all the rest.

What impact is the Safe Schools Act having? It is still early to say, but there are some good signs. TFT recently asked members to respond again to the school violence questionnaire originally sent out in 1993. This before-and-after comparison was encouraging:

• The number of teachers reporting threats of violence to students Was down by 6 percent .

• The number reporting threats of violence to themselves was down by 33 percent.

• The number reporting assaults by students on other students was down by 10 percent.

• The number saying that they had been assaulted in the past year was down by 3 5 percent.

It is true that the numbers remain very high for many of these problems. For instance, 59 percent of teachers still report threats of physical violence to students and 4 7 percent, assaults by students on other students. Nevertheless, the downward trends suggest that, thanks to the Safe Schools Act, many Texas classrooms are already beginning to be better places for learning

The bad news is that enforcement is spotty: Only 35 percent of the teachers said their district was trying to enforce the new law. Even worse is the news of a movement to weaken the law during this legislative session. Critics say the Safe Schools Act is a big example of micromanagement and a blow against local control. They hope to curtail the authority it gives teachers air(] allow administrators more "flexibility" in deciding when to exercise zero tolerance and when to make exceptions. In other words, they want to remove many of the provisions that are already making the law effective.

Undoubtedly, giving administrators the freedom to relax the rules would make life easier for them: It's no full trying to tell angry parents why you can't make an exception for their child. But John Cole, president of TFT, points out exactly why this kind of leeway would also be counterproductive (Richardson [Texas] News, December 8, 1996): To establish air orderly learning environment, you have to draw lines and tell Students they may not cross those lines. Once you begin to make air exception for one student the hire becomes blurred and the rule loses meaning. If we say that a student caught with one beer at school is riot a big deal, you can be sure that some student Will try to bring two beers, and then claim, "I was only one beer over the line, so what is the big deal?"

If you begin to make exceptions for honor Students who are caught with marijuana, other students will point out, "You let him go; it is not fair to treat me differently."

And, unfortunately, with more "flexibility" will also come racial and ethnic discrimination.

Going back to the status quo, which is what critics propose, is a bad idea. We already know that it doesn't work. We also know the Texas Safe Schools Act is a strong piece of legislation that is likely to be effective -- that's obvious from the impact it has had after only one year in which the level of enforcement was not very high. The law deserves a chance to work.

We talk a lot about improving the educational performance of all, our students. Many states are busy setting academic standards, and some are even talking about tying assessments to these standards. But the truth of the matter is that none of these changes will achieve what we want unless schools are safe and orderly places where teachers can reach and students can learn. The citizens of Texas took a big first step in making this possible. They must not retreat.