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(From left ) Teri Sparks (Paralegal, Disability Rights Maryland), Erika Wheeler (Special Olympic Athlete and Self-Advocate), Carol Beatty (Secretary, Maryland Department of Disabilities), Jennifer Eastman (MBA Director of Community Living Policy, Maryland Department of Disabilities)

Disability Rights Maryland’s (DRM) Terri Sparks, and Erika Wheeler, Special Olympic Athlete and Self-Advocate, co-chairs of the Ethan Saylor Alliance Steering Committee, attended the Ethan Saylor Alliance Police Training and Appreciation Event on August 11, 2019, at the Public Safety and Education Training Center in Sykesville, Maryland.

The event was held to increase awareness of new policies instituted to better train and prepare Maryland’s law enforcement officers about their interactions with individuals who have intellectual and/or developmental disabilities. Ultimately, the goal is to ensure safe, respectful and effective outcomes for all. The Alliance is focused on the development of programs that instruct and support people with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities as educators and establish meaningful roles for self-advocates on police training teams. The Ethan Saylor Alliance Police Training and Appreciation Event acknowledged and thanked the officers who understand that training by self-advocates is important in meeting the needs of the people police serve.

Learn more about the Ethan Saylor Alliance: https://disabilityrightsmd.org/ethan-saylor-alliance/

The United States Commission on Civil Rights (USCCR) recently released a report titled “Beyond Suspensions, Examining School Discipline Policies and Connections to the School-to Prison Pipeline for Students of Color with Disabilities.”  In this comprehensive report, the USCCR reviews  research detailing the harmful impacts of exclusionary discipline (suspensions and expulsions), states that data in the U.S. Department of Education reports show a consistent pattern of schools suspending or expelling African American students with disabilities at higher rates than their proportion of the population of students with disabilities,” and makes key findings and recommendations for reducing disparities and ensuring non-discriminatory discipline in schools. 

Disability Rights Maryland (DRM) has been actively working to address the impact of exclusionary discipline on students with disabilities, which is highlighted in the report. In a section that discusses federal investigations of discriminatory discipline practices in schools, the former Director of Legal Advocacy at DRM, Alyssa Fieo, is quoted on page 62 regarding DRM’s work in connection with the Department of Justice’s Settlement Agreement with Wicomico County Public Schools over its discriminatory discipline practices affecting students of color and students with disabilities.  Ms. Fieo states that DRM was concerned about the number of student arrests, specifically that the arrests were allegedly happening “due to behavior that was related to a disability.”  The report goes on to detail some of the steps Wicomico County Public Schools had to take to remedy discriminatory discipline practices pursuant to the Settlement Agreement.  Check out the report here: https://www.usccr.gov/pubs/2019/07-23-Beyond-Suspensions.pdf

DRM’s annual community survey is open.  Please tell us what legal issues you would like us to address next year by taking our survey online now.  Contact our office at 410-727-6352 ext. 0 if you need to access the survey in alternate formats, or to give your responses by phone.  You can also print the survey and mail it to our office by August 23, 2019.   Thank you for your feedback!