NEW YORK, MARCH 29, 2011 (The New York Times): While the image of the high school principal patrolling the halls with paddle in hand is largely of the past, corporal punishment is still alive in 20 states, according to the Center for Effective Discipline, a group that tracks its use in schools around the country and advocates for its end. Most of those states are in the South, where paddling remains engrained in the social and family fabric of some communities.
Each year, prodded by child safety advocates, state legislatures debate whether corporal punishment amounts to an archaic form of child abuse or an effective means of discipline. According to estimates by the federal Department of Education, 223,190 children were subject to corporal punishment in schools in the 2005-6 school year. That was nearly a 20 percent drop from data gathered a few years earlier.
In Texas, at least 27 out of about 1,000 school districts still use corporal punishment, said Jimmy Dunne, founder and president of another group that is against the practice, People Opposed to Paddling Students. “Hitting children in our schools with boards is child abuse, and it promotes child abuse at home,” said Mr. Dunne, a former math teacher in Houston. “Parents see it’s legal in schools and think it’s O.K. to do at home.”
In New Mexico, where more than a third of the state’s school districts permit corporal punishment, according to a local children’s legal services group, legislators approved a paddling ban this month. Gov. Susana Martinez has not indicated whether she will sign the bill.
Senator Cynthia Nava, a school superintendant from Las Cruces and proponent of the ban, said schools were no place for violence of any sort. “It’s shocking to me that people got up on the floor and argued passionately to preserve it,” she said. “We should be educating kids that they can’t solve problems with violence.”