Interview: First Sergeant Walter Shawn McDaniel, Disability/School Resource Officer Policy

Robbie Kopp and First Sergeant McDaniels discuss their work creating the nation’s first school resource officer/disability policy. The two talk about how the policy works and how can be implemented not just in schools, but throughout our society. First Sergeant McDaniels also shares an impactful story about how his work creating this policy and his personal life intersected.

Big announcement at the end of the podcast!

 

 

Disclaimer

Able South Carolina is providing this podcast as a public service, but it is neither a legal interpretation nor a statement of local, state, or federal legislation or policy. Reference to any specific product or entity does not constitute an endorsement or recommendation by Able South Carolina. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an Able South Carolina endorsement of them or any entity they represent. If you have any questions about this disclaimer, please contact us at advocacy@able-sc.org

 

Episode Transcript:

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00:14 Chris: It has been 11,087 days since the Americans with Disabilities Act was passed, and you are parked in The Access Aisle.

 

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00:32 Chris: Welcome back to The Access Aisle, everyone. Thank you for joining us. We have an incredible episode for you today. We continue our interview with Robbie Kopp, and First Sergeant Walter Shawn McDaniels is a 24-year vet of the Richland County Sheriff's Office. We feel really honored to have you here, First Sergeant McDaniels. You bring such a unique perspective to this conversation, one that doesn't usually get brought to this conversation, one that's usually left out, and so to have you here to open up with us and to be vulnerable definitely brings a fresh air to what's a normally stale conversation.

 

01:15 Chris: Today's interview should be of great interest to any parent, to a child with a disability and any student with a disability, because Robbie Kopp and First Sergeant McDaniels are gonna talk publicly about the work that they've done to create the nation's first school resource officer/disability policy. One of the larger unintended consequences of having police officers in schools is that students with disabilities, especially black students with disabilities, are being referred to the SROs at a higher rate and more often being criminally punished for actions or behaviors for which they normally would not have had to face legal action or consequences prior to SROs being in schools, and so this change has had a dramatic and negative effect on a lot of students with disabilities.

 

02:15 Chris: So Robbie Kopp and First Sergeant McDaniels, they talk about this collaboration between the Richland County Sheriff's Office and Able South Carolina, how it originated, what the policy says, and how it can be used as a model, and not just in schools and education, but also throughout other institutions that face issues of racial inequity and just the American culture in general. There's some really fascinating stuff here, I hope you enjoy it. Before we start though, last week, I teased a huge surprise announcement. I have it for you, it's burning in my hands right now, but my producers tell me that we have to wait until after the interview. So we have a huge announcement, it's going to happen, we're gonna give you this announcement, but we're gonna do it right after the interview. So without further ado, Robbie Kopp and First Sergeant McDaniels.

 

03:10 Robbie Kopp: I wanna talk a little bit about the work that we did... This is not not our first conversation. [chuckle] The work that we did with Richland County around student resource officers a few years ago. It started maybe not the way that you would have liked. [laughter] Do you wanna set the stage for how we met?

 

03:30 First Sergeant Walter Shawn McDaniels: Sure. Sure, I can. So back in 2015, May of 2015, the United States Department of Justice received a two-prong complaint against the Richland County Sheriff Department School Resource Officer program. And the complaint, well, the complaints were that African-American students were disproportionately getting arrested and that school resource officers were dealing with students who have a disability from an uninformed position. And so fast forward to October of 2015, for those of you who remember, that's the same month that we had the 1000-year flood here in South Carolina, Columbia.

 

04:17 FM: Two weeks after that situation, we had an incident that occurred at Spring Valley High School involving a white male school resource officer and a black female student. And, of course, you know that got CNN attention, nationwide attention, it was globalized on a grand scale. And so, of course, the Department of Justice put a halt to their initial investigation into those two accusations that I mentioned earlier. And after they closed out the case involving Spring Valley, Sheriff Lott decided that in conjunction with the Department of Justice, they came to a mutual agreement that, "We need to look into the accusations, we need to conduct some research, we need to try to measure and become data-informed in those areas," and we did that for a three-year period.

 

05:18 FM: I was brought in as one of the liaisons to help with facilitating that research. It didn't help at the time. At the time, I had just started the PhD program in conflict analysis and resolution. So mind you, it was a professional PhD, in addition to an academic PhD that I had to start. We were required to develop a report at the end of the second and the end of the third year. But prior to that, in looking at the evidence early on within the three-year period, we discovered that we did not have the advanced training that we needed to have in the areas of disabilities, and we wanted to get that as soon as possible. As a matter of fact, for the research, even through the Department of Justice, the Office of Civil Rights revealed that it wasn't just us that this problem is stretched across the country within law enforcement as it relates to the area of disabilities. And so we've had to come up with a policy to address that, and so that was one of the first problems that we attacked.

 

06:32 FM: And so I know that I'm not smart enough to develop such a policy by myself, 'cause again, operating from a law enforcement position would have limited my knowledge of what that looks like and what needs to be brought to the table. And so we reached out to several organizations. We reached out to Lexington-Richland School District Five, we reached out to South Carolina Able, and that's how I met... That's how I met you, Robbie, and then you came in. And we also had a child psychiatrist, we reached out to P&A law firm, a leading law firm here within South Carolina on behalf of the rights of children.

 

07:17 FM: And I remember the first meeting. If you don't mind, I'd like to talk about how... [chuckle] How everyone came to the meeting naturally. There was some defensive jockeying, if you will, some defensive positioning, because we were so used to operating within silos, and it's pointing the finger at one another in terms of where the problem lie. But there was this period, and I'm quite sure you felt the same way, you could speak to it on your own, but where we began to externalize the problem and we began to mutually learn that we each had a contribution, and dealing with the conflict of the absence of education and training in the areas of disabilities. And so from that, Robbie, as you know, we developed the nation's first school resource officer disability policy, and it was just awesome how that came together, yeah.

 

08:21 RK: Yeah, and I'm gonna make that policy available when the... As the podcast is released or wherever you access it from, whether it's the Able SC website or the Access Aisle podcast page, there'll be a link to that SRO policy so that you can get into the weeds with Sergeant McDaniels and I and really look at the work that took place and what was needed. I think just for me, in that experience, seeing the overlap of African-American students and students with disabilities, and how they were both getting... They were both having interactions with law enforcement through the SROs that weren't equivalent for other groups. For me, I think that was one of the biggest pieces. And I note that it's probably my privilege has made this possible, but this was the big crossover that I saw between the disability community and students of color, knowing that this was happening and that students were being taken out in handcuffs and for relatively minor infractions, and that damage was being done at the school with peers and students were being labeled as problems where they may have been working through some behaviors related to their disability or some of the trauma that they had experienced at home.

 

09:47 RK: So I, in the last few weeks, have really thought back to this policy and the way that it has changed interactions with SROs in Richland County, and hoping to see something systemic and wanting to see something systemic for law enforcement beyond that. We had some conversations around law enforcement response and making sure that law enforcement are always... They're always safe, but not at the detriment that they're using excessive force against a student, and I think we're seeing other manifestations of that in law enforcement and other places.

 

10:28 RK: Sergeant, what was... There's one thing that I think stands out for me the most when we were working on this policy, and that was really identifying the tools that law enforcement have. Does... I wanna see if the same thing stands out for you without me saying what it is. [chuckle] We talked about a tool that hadn't really been used. First, assess the safety of a situation. And then second, was being able to use time as a tool to help de-escalate a situation before there was a physical interaction, before there was charges filed, but that there was a chance to... For the law enforcement presence to be known and for the student to re-center and make sure that they're in a place that they can have a conversation around their behavior. Do you remember that part, and when we were really nailing that and feeling comfortable? 'Cause I feel like that was a bit of a watershed moment for the group.

 

11:23 FM: I would agree. Actually, you're talking about the TIER strategy that we came up with, and TIER is an acronym for Team Intervention Emergency Response. And I remember when the aha-moment... Now, mind you, just to help our listeners internalize that process, it was a facilitation, for lack of a better expression or example rather, the facilitation where we... You get representative from different factions, and we all come together to address a common conflict, and we began to... After the first meeting and everyone was able to voice their... They were allowed to be... It was a safe space to be emotional, it was a safe space to be... To question one another.

 

12:15 FM: And once we got past that, we saw the need to not work and to not operate within our own silos, but to see the importance of mutually learning and moving forward with externalizing the problem. We externalized it, and so it was no longer law enforcement's fault, no longer education... Educator, and at the education system's fault. We... It took flight. And I think the moment that you're talking about is what... That's when we all recognized a shift, if you will, in how we began to operate as a unified team dealing with that externalized problem separated from the individuals, and we started moving and we came with the TIER.

 

13:05 FM: I remember we were all excited about what does it mean? And we... Everyone knew that safety was first and foremost, which that satisfied my concern, and from a law enforcement perspective, and then we began to say, "Well, how do we get the teachers, the school resource officer, the school psychiatrist, to the counselors to begin to work together?" And we developed the TIER system, and it consisted of Tier I, which was... And I'll just read from it. Tier I is where the SRO provides a supportive presence only either in or outside of the classroom or a specific area as specified by the school's behalf. In this tier, there is no need, there is no need for the SRO to have direct contact, and again, while still assessing.

 

13:54 FM: Tier II is the SRO provides a supportive physical presence and assist the school faculty in using de-escalation and other advanced mediation techniques; clearing the classroom or moving furniture out in an effort to help the teacher navigate that problem with the student. And of course, Tier III is when there's a need for law enforcement to intervene, and when safety becomes an issue. And so that was crucial, to develop that TIER system. It speaks for itself, it's about the team and not necessarily calling the muscle, being the school resource officer, to come deal with a school-related problem.

 

14:35 RK: Yeah, and I... With every instance of either police brutality or police showing up to a scene and on reports of violent crime that aren't substantiated, and how those situations escalate so quickly, I keep thinking about this policy, I keep thinking about how that little bit of time to assess the situation and to make sure that as long as everybody's safe, then we can be okay with being safe and taking some time is... It just, it comes back to me every single story. And I think it's so much a part of, I'm having a hard time saying this clearly, that time has the ability for us to see past that initial response, where that initial response is... Because it's quick, it's more likely to be influenced by that, by that bias, and when we're able to have that breath or that half-breath to realize what's happening, that the situation can go differently, and without that time with actions that are the difference between quick and hasty, having a huge impact on the lives of people. It just seems more and more necessary to me that when interacting with a person with a disability, maybe knowing how their disability may impact that interaction and being prepared to navigate that without the use of a weapon, I think is tough.

 

16:12 FM: Yeah, one of the challenges that we have within law enforcement in dealing with students who have a disability is that parents struggle with their child being labeled as someone with a disability, a student with a disability, because they believe that they're... Again, 'cause they're conscious of some of the negative stigma associated with it, and they don't want their child to have to navigate through that obstacle, if you will. And so oftentimes, some of the students and their disabilities, they're not acknowledged, and so an officer doesn't have access to that information.

 

16:58 FM: And we noticed that during the study too, that you had a good number of individuals who were suffering with a disability, but suffering... When I say suffering with it, I mean because they were not given the opportunity to receive appropriate modified services. Appropriate, appropriate as it relates to their disability, not to the extent of treating them different in such a way where it limits them even more or it's unfair, an unfair distribution of services. No, it was they were silently dealing with some of the limitations unjustifiably placed upon them every day.

 

17:48 FM: And so it boils down to the absence of communication, the... When the negative stigma stops the parent from sharing, then of course, the end result is an interaction with law enforcement or with an authority within the school, an authoritative person within the school. And we're not able to service the child properly, which is why we train our officers in the area of disability identification, and the areas of autism and mental illness, well, mental wellness rather, and what does that look like for our student body today. We did that for three years in a row, provided that training, and so we need to continue to do that.

 

18:42 RK: Yeah, I think for me, in doing that work, I kept thinking to an example of a student who would be impacted and may have had a negative interaction with law enforcement. You mentioned autism, for me, the example was a student with autism who there was too much stimulation in that environment, and needed to be able to process and cool back down. Knowing that if law enforcement came in heavy into that situation, that it was only gonna escalate, but if an SRO is able to stand in the doorway and to give the teacher the support and even move other students out so that there's less noise and less stimulation, then that would be beneficial to the student and you can address the behavior when the student is ready to be back in that place. So that's... I think that's... The real life examples help to really shed light on what was happening and what could have been happening instead.

 

19:40 FM: I'd like to share this one story, this is... It's almost like a watershed moment, at least for me, it was. If you remember where my office was located in the back of Spring Hill High School where we first started meeting in that small little closet. And up until that point, I did not know that that was primarily where most of the students who were dealing with challenges, disabilities, if you will, that they were actually... Most of their classes were back there where my office was positioned. And I remember once we developed the TIER strategy, I remember sitting in my office and the door was open, and it seemed as if... This is... It's gonna sound crazy, but this is an actual true... This is a true story. Whenever I looked up, I would see one of the students go by and it just... Our eyes would connect, that seemed crazy to me. So I knew that it was... Creating the nation's first disability policy for law enforcement was bigger than us, it was bigger than us.

 

20:52 FM: And I remember noticing that everyone seemed to say hello to me, or nod their head. That was crazy. And in that moment, Robbie, this is true, I got a phone call from my son's teacher who, at the time, he was in the fifth grade, and another student's parent came in for a conference, and this particular student had a disability that not many of the kids knew about, some socialization challenges that caused him to have some socialization challenges. And so my son... The parent actually wanted to commend my son for making sure that everyone treated and gave this particular student the opportunity to play in the football game, and how he... And it really broke me down honestly in that moment while I was penning what we came up with as a group into our template, our policy template.

 

22:03 FM: So I saw the student... Imagine, I saw the students walking towards me while they were changing classes, giving me non-verbal cues that they were behind me, and then to get the phone call in the moment from the teacher saying that my son, which was across town at the time, was being acknowledged by a parent whose child had a disability because he treated their child like a person should be treated. 'Cause the child would go home and talk about my son, "Siya this and Siya that." And so anyway, I just said... I just knew then that it was bigger than us because you have to understand, the law enforcement's a culture. And so when you start creating and changing and modifying policy within any culture, you're gonna meet with, depending on the change, a certain degree of resistance, and so I was having to fight with that. Luckily for me, the sheriff was in full support of it. And so at the end of the day, that's all that matters.

 

[chuckle]

 

23:19 RK: It goes a long way, yeah.

 

23:21 FM: It goes a long way, he was in support of it. And it's just, it's a natural resistance associated with change and we're still working through that.

 

23:30 RK: Yeah. I think we're systemically seeing the calls for change and that there's a real need for us to rethink what law enforcement interaction looks like and what supports are provided. Because outside of a school, law enforcement is so often the one-stop. It's operating on an island and has to respond to mental health calls, and responds to crime, responds to any number of things, and as a result, I think there's a lot of pressure for law enforcement to be everything to everyone and I don't know that that can work. I think that's what really made this policy so strong, was when a situation is fairly and well-managed that there's more room for the school psychologist to address behavior with that student afterwards because they're not in jail, [chuckle] and that student can get the support they need, and I think we're gonna continue to see the pressure for that in the conversation of what needs to happen in communities across the country to make sure that the supports are there, so that law enforcement isn't as necessary.

 

24:40 FM: Yeah. And if I may add to that, we have to get the... What we created in that room on a micro level, it needs to be reproduced on a macro level when it comes to racial indifference, when it comes indifference towards disability population. You don't get just to take care of your own. It's an unfair expectation that's self-created when you believe that you're only responsible for those who exist within your own backyard. It's a self-created expectation that we have to get rid of. We bear an obligation to see ourselves in those traffic stops that have gone wrong, where the use of force has been abused, if you will. And so I take and bring... I guess bringing the conversation slightly back towards racial indifference, people know that suburban America is policed differently, we just have to stop acting like it's not. And so when you have law enforcement acting as if it's not, then that causes problems.

 

26:08 FM: And let's just be honest, the only difference between drug usage in suburban America and impoverished America is that you get the good cocaine in suburban America. [chuckle] The keg parties happened, the drug usage happened, opioid use has taken off, but the patrolling directives are different. I can go to the suburbs and pull people for minor traffic violations all day every day, they're not better drivers in suburban America. And so we have to focus our efforts in the areas where predominantly African-Americans live? No, that's a choice to have selective patrol directives, that's a choice. And guess what? People know that. People know that. And so that's why we have to fix that. We have to address that.

 

27:21 RK: Absolutely. And I think we're seeing the effects of over-policing in minority communities, and we're seeing those impacts that it's become impossible to look away, and that there is change that comes with that. I think what's... The next place of the conversation and what I'm hearing more from organizers is the call for not just less law enforcement, but the same level of supportive services. If a neighborhood is dangerous or deemed dangerous, it's not likely to have parks programs for kids, that's just how it works. And because there's no parks programs for kids, there's nothing else for kids to do. [chuckle] And the decisions that come with that may, for some, lead to other law enforcement interactions, and their neighborhood's more likely to be policed. So it's over-policing and under-serving in a lot of ways with how communities operate. So I'm glad to see those calls rising. When we say, "What's a community with a reduced law enforcement presence look like?" It looks like the suburbs, because that's what... [chuckle] We see that already, that's just... That's kind of the answer to that question. But I think it's important that we continue to have these, and it's important that the disability community know that there is a role for people with disabilities in these conversations.

 

29:04 FM: Sure.

 

29:05 RK: And there is a role for everyone to look at your life, to weigh your position, to find ways that maybe you've had it easier, maybe that you have an increased voice and an opportunity to pass the mic and raise the perspective of the folks in your community that are seeing the problems if you're not. But the work is happening, the work is needed, vitally important. So glad that you share this conversation with me and that you are doing the good work that you're doing at Richland County, and Able South Carolina will continue to participate in the conversation and further the real human-hood of every person as it should be taken. We have to see past indifference and use our role to make the systems better.

 

30:10 Chris: Well, that was an incredible interview. Thank you, Robbie, and thank you First Sergeant McDaniels. I think the moment that stood out to me was the story that he told about First Sergeant McDaniels, when he talked about his son's teacher. So often people don't understand the disability experience unless you have a close family member with a disability or someone that you live with. Those that do, those people that do live with those individuals, they're the ones that usually end up becoming what we call the champions of people with disabilities. And I think it's because those people have the chance to see that person as a person and more than just a disability, they get to really experience what that life is like and understand that this is just a person just like me. And I feel like that same thing basically happened here in that when First Sergeant McDaniel's son, he basically taught him a lesson about how we should treat other people, and not just people with disabilities, but everyone and I think that speaks to this entire conversation that we've been having about racial disparities in America. And if we treat each other as equals and with genuine care and respect, then it just makes everyone's life better.

 

31:32 Chris: Okay, everyone, I think it's time for our big announcement. I know I've been putting it off long enough. I'm just gonna go ahead and say, I'm gonna let everyone know, I don't really care what the producers say, it's time, we're gonna say it. And the big announcement is... Drum roll, please.

 

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31:55 Chris: This is the final episode of The Access Aisle. That's right. In January 2021, we will re-emerge as the Stop the Shush Podcast with Sparrow and The Bear. So yes, this is our last episode of The Access Aisle. We're gonna be transitioning to a new format. I will be your new host, Sparrow, and I am bringing along a friend. Allow me to introduce your new co-host, The Bear.

 

32:29 Bauer: Hello, hello. Thank you, Chris. Yes, I am The Bear, also known as Bauer. I will answer to either name. I'm really excited to be with you, Chris. I'm really excited to start this new adventure with you. So yeah, very exciting things.

 

32:44 Chris: Yes, yes, they are very exciting things. We are going to be starting a new format, we're gonna be changing things around a little bit. The podcast is not gonna sound like it used to sound, so new year, new sound. Bauer, tell me, what are some things that you're excited about with this new podcast?

 

33:04 Bauer: I think the main thing I'm really excited about is all the different conversations we're gonna have, and I'm not just talking about with you and me, but the conversations we're gonna have with our listeners. We're gonna make this interactive, we're gonna ask for feedback from y'all. But having conversations about topics that we don't generally talk about, things that we push under the rug, things that we shush. Deciding to not do that, deciding to take all of those taboo topics and bring them out into the open, so that we can make the change that we need to see in our society, I think is a really important and a really exciting thing.

 

33:42 Chris: So how worried are you that we're going to get in trouble at some point with something that we say? [laughter]

 

33:48 Bauer: I'm usually a goody-two-shoes, so I usually err on the side of not getting in trouble, or trying to not get in trouble, so we'll see how exciting it actually does get. [chuckle] But yeah, no, I think pushing the boundaries just a little bit is not a bad thing within decency's sake.

 

[chuckle]

 

34:10 Chris: Yeah, we're gonna have some good... We're gonna have a good time, we're gonna make this thing fun, we're gonna make it lively, we're gonna bring in some good banter, we're gonna have some fun guests, and we're gonna talk about these things that we normally don't get to talk about. And so we want it to be focused on the consumer, we want it to be focused on people out there with disabilities, and getting a chance to give you a voice and to bring light to topics that you don't normally get to talk about. So that is our goal, that is what we look forward to. So Bauer, Bear, we will see you and we will see the rest of the crew in January 2021, and we look forward to it, and watch out for the Stop the Shush Podcast with Sparrow and The Bear.

 

35:03 Bauer: Thanks, Sparrow. See you soon.

 

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