SCSJ Digest

SCSJ Digest
The Monthly Newsletter of SCSJ's Top News
Welcome to SCSJ Digest, the monthly newsletter of the Southern Coalition for
Social Justice! At the beginning of every month, we'll send you a roundup of the
top stories from the previous month, along with relevant updates, e.g., key
resources, upcoming events, and noteworthy projects. If you have any
recommendations on additional topics you want to read about, please let us
know. We hope you enjoy this newsletter!
IN THIS ISSUE
Letter from the Executive Directors
Updates
Partner Profile
Student Showcase
Events in April
Top Stories in March 2021
Letter from the Executive Directors
From Allison Riggs and Ryan Roberson
Spring has officially begun, and the new season ushers in a sense of hope and
resilience as more Americans continue to get vaccinated against COVID-19. Yet
with the promise of restored hope comes a sense of continued despair and
tragedy, as we all learned about the brazen shootings of 10 people in Boulder,
Colorado on March 22 and eight people—six of whom were women of Asian
descent—in Georgia on March 16. These senseless acts of hatred and violence
result when racism and misogyny intersect, and unfortunately, we have seen it
occur all too often. We offer our deepest sympathies to the families who lost
loved ones in recent weeks, and we stand even more resolute to fight for our
democratic values of equality, liberty, and justice.
In other news, we are pleased to announce that our 2019-20 Racial Equity
Report Cards (RERCs) are now available online! With the help of our partner
Red Hat, we've launched a more user-friendly, easily digestible overview of the
RERCs that viewers can access.
The RERCs use public data to provide a snapshot of a community’s school-to-

prison pipeline, including any racial disproportionalities that exist in the pipeline.
There is a Report Card for each of the state’s 115 school districts and one for our
home state of North Carolina as a whole.
This year’s report cards primarily use 2019-2020 academic year data, which is
limited due to the impact COVID-19 had on schools and students. For example,
North Carolina did not release data on end-of-grade and end-of-course tests at
the end of the 2019-2020 school year, so this data is not available for inclusion in
this year’s report cards.
Key findings of the 2019-2020 North Carolina RERC include:
• Black students were 3.9 times more likely than white students to receive a
short-term suspension.
• Statewide, 29.9% of all juvenile referrals to the criminal justice system came
from schools, down significantly from 45.1% in the 2018-2019 RERC. However,
Black students remain disproportionately impacted, accounting for 49.0% of all
incidents being referred to the criminal justice system compared to 35.2% among
white students.
• While 54.5% of students in North Carolina schools are people of color, only
23% of teachers are. Having a diverse school staff is one way to help equalize
opportunities for students of color.
• Latinx students are the least likely to graduate from high school in four years,
with statewide graduation rates of 81.7%. In comparison, 90.8% of white
students graduate in four years.
Read more about the most-recent RERCs on our website, and take a look at the
image below.
Finally, we're taking a brief hiatus with our monthly newsletter and will be back
later this spring or early summer. Stay tuned!
In Solidarity,
Allison Riggs and Ryan Roberson

Co-Executive Directors
Updates
Key resources, noteworthy projects, etc.
Racial Equity Report Cards
“The changes of the past year have significantly increased attention on how safe
students are in the classroom. But as school districts work to ensure students are
physically safe in schools amid COVID-19 concerns, they also need to take
action to protect students from the harms of institutional inequity and racism,”
said Tyler Whittenberg, SCSJ's Chief Counsel for Justice System Reform. “As
indicated by the 2019-2020 RERCs, much work still needs to be done, including
reducing the use of exclusionary discipline and limiting the number of students
who enter the justice system via the classroom – two practices that
disproportionately and detrimentally impact students of color throughout North
Carolina.”
Partner Profile
Monthly feature of our partners' work

ACLU of North Carolina
Founded in 1965, the ACLU of North Carolina, an affiliate of the national

American Civil Liberties Union, is a private, nonprofit, nonpartisan organization
that stands as the state’s guardian of liberty – working in courts, the General
Assembly, and communities to protect and advance civil rights and civil liberties
for all North Carolinians.
The ACLU of North Carolina brings together litigation, legislative advocacy,

communications, and organizing strategies to empower communities and
achieve their objectives in major issue areas including criminal law reform, racial
justice, LGBTQ equality, reproductive freedom, and the rights of immigrants.
Recently, the ACLU of North Carolina achieved a landmark settlement that

will lead to the release of 3,500 people from NC prisons; secured more
comprehensive screening and treatment for Hepatitis C for people incarcerated
in North Carolina; and are part of a newly formed immigrants’ rights
coalition challenging anti-immigrant proposals at the General Assembly.
Student Showcase
Resources created by SCSJ's student volunteers and interns
Our NC State University student and Creative Intern, Sarah Curry, continues to
create beautiful designs that we feature on our social media channels. Take a
look at some of her work below!
Events in April
Follow us on social media to stay up to date and register!
Thursday, 4/22: Ella Baker Panel
Featuring: Tyler Whittenberg
Tuesday, 4/27 - Thursday, 4/29: South Carolina CROWD Academy

State Partners: SC Appleseed Legal Justice Center and SC Counts
Thursday, 4/29: Lawyers Weekly Diversity & Inclusion Virtual Awards

Ceremony
Featuring: Ryan Roberson and Allison Riggs
Top Stories in March 2021 back to top

8 Articles
The Guardian
US supreme court could deal blow to provision

protecting minority voters
Published Mar 1, 2021 by Sam Levine
The US Supreme Court will hear a case on Tuesday that could allow the court’s
conservative majority to deal a major blow to the most powerful remaining
provision of the Voting Rights Act, the 1965 law designed to prevent racial
discrimination in voting.
WECT News
New Hanover Co. Board of Education discusses

request to end suspensions among elementary
schools
Published Mar 3, 2021 by Anna Phillips
NEW HANOVER COUNTY, N.C. (WECT) - The New Hanover County Board of
Education discussed a petition from the New Hanover County NAACP to end
school suspensions among elementary schools during their regular monthly
meeting on Tuesday, March 2.
The Fayetteville Observer
5 things you need to know about the 'driving while

Black' issue in Fayetteville
Published Mar 3, 2021 by Steve DeVane
The Fayetteville Observer analyzed data that included hundreds of thousands of
traffic stops and searches for a series of stories focusing on a controversy that
caused an uproar in the community a decade ago.
Talking Points Memo
The Coming Redistricting Cycle Will Test Just What

Biden’s DOJ Can Do With A Gutted VRA
Published Mar 19, 2021 by Tierney Sneed
There’s no playbook for how President Biden’s Justice Department can protect
minority voting rights in the coming round of redistricting. When state legislatures
draw their maps later this year, it will be the first time that most of them do so
since the Supreme Court’s Shelby County decision in 2013.
Greenville News
100 voices tell us what future of police should be

Published Mar 23, 2021 by Jeff Schwaner, Staunton News Leader
Crime touches millions of Americans every year. What affects more people?
Police behavior. Countless daily moments of interaction, personal and
impersonal, determine whether a person trusts or distrusts the police. And in
hundreds of cases a year, that determines whether a person lives or dies.
WCNC
Black CMS students 7 times more likely to be

suspended, report finds
Published Mar 24, 2021
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Black students are seven times more likely to be
suspended than their white counterparts, according to an analysis of data from
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools that revealed a deep disparity in how students
are disciplined.
U.S. News & World Report
N.C. Court to Decide if Voter Defamation Lawsuit

Can Proceed
Published Mar 24, 2021 by BRYAN ANDERSON
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A North Carolina appeals court panel will soon decide
whether a libel complaint can proceed to trial over false accusations that
representatives of former Gov. Pat McCrory made in 2016 alleging several voters
had unlawfully cast multiple ballots, were ineligible due to a felony conviction or
voted in the name of dead people.
NC Policy Watch
PW special report – The battle for Alamance part 2:

The modern day struggle for political representation
Published Mar 26, 2021 by Lynn Bonner
Decades after the enactment of civil rights laws, people of color remain largely
excluded from the county’s political power structure. To go to Alamance County
is to step back in time, to the days of the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and
1960s.

SCSJ Digest - April 2021

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The Monthly Newsletter of SCSJ's Top News

Letter from the Executive Directors

From Allison Riggs and Ryan Roberson

The RERCs use public data to provide a snapshot of a community’s school-to-

Key findings of the 2019-2020 North Carolina RERC include:

Allison Riggs and Ryan Roberson

Racial Equity Report Cards

Monthly feature of our partners' work

Founded in 1965, the ACLU of North Carolina, an affiliate of the national

The ACLU of North Carolina brings together litigation, legislative advocacy,

Recently, the ACLU of North Carolina achieved a landmark settlement that

Resources created by SCSJ's student volunteers and interns

Tuesday, 4/27 - Thursday, 4/29: South Carolina CROWD Academy

Thursday, 4/29: Lawyers Weekly Diversity & Inclusion Virtual Awards

Top Stories in March 2021 back to top

US supreme court could deal blow to provision

New Hanover Co. Board of Education discusses

5 things you need to know about the 'driving while

Talking Points Memo

The Coming Redistricting Cycle Will Test Just What

100 voices tell us what future of police should be

Black CMS students 7 times more likely to be

U.S. News & World Report

N.C. Court to Decide if Voter Defamation Lawsuit

PW special report – The battle for Alamance part 2:

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