If you have listened to the above, you might wonder what I was talking about when I said that if I had been teaching at Stratford High School when the raid was conducted, I wouldn't be here today. The Stratford High School raid happened in early November of '03. It took eight or nine months to sort out this episode of [understatement] poor police/community relations [/understatement], and the case drew the attention of the FBI, ACLU, and NAACP. It stands in stark contrast to the example of the police/gang intervention I described that is happening currently in Watts.

Here is what I saw on the videotape that was presented on the evening news. The school had been paid a surprise early-morning visit by a group of police with their drug-sniffing dogs. They appear on the surveillance camera with guns drawn and dogs straining at their leashes. The stream of students is crouched with head covered or lying on the floor in fetal position at the foot of the lockers. Later, the principal resigned his position, and there were numerous law suits brought by the parents against the school, the police, etc. There were investigations by the above-named groups. The controversy raged on the editorial pages about the undue show of force and the use of racial profiling in the planning of the raid.

As far as I was concerned, those students were victims of an act of terrorism perpetrated by their so-called protectors. If my classroom had been in that hall, my own knee-jerk reflex to protect those for whom I am responsible would have directed me NOT to lie on the floor, but rather to do what I could to protect "my" students. I probably would have tried to hustle as many as possible into my classroom where they could sit with dignity while waiting for whatever was going on in the hallway to be sorted out. I may have been shot or mangled in the process, but I believe that guns have no place in schools, and as a teacher, I always tried to keep my "domain" as safe and friendly as possible.

"Blue in a Red State"