Schools Try Code To Deter Crime

While reporting that the implementation of a revised Uniform Code of Student Conduct has gone well, an assistant superintendent of Detroit schools said last week that it is not an "end-all" in controlling student behavior.

"The student code is a disciplinary tool and is in no way considered an absolute end in controlling disruptive behavior," Charles Wells, assistant superintendent in the office of pupil services, told The Sun.

"The answer is self-control on the part of the student, and the gaining of self-control must be a part of any educational system," he said.

The Uniform Code of Student Conduct resulted trom U.S. District Judge Robert E. DeMascio's school desegregation ruling and has been in operation since January 1976.

Wells said he had no figures on code violations.

He told The Sun that the problem of discipline in Detroit schools is "comparable to the problems being faced in the community relative to the people who insist on involving themselves in criminal activity.

"The presence of those problems puts upon the schools the problem of supplying a safe environment for learning," he said.

Wells added that while there have always been fights in the schools, it has never been as organized as it is now with the gangs. He said that violence in the past was spontaneous, sometimes erupting at a sporting or similar school event.

Wells said that now, however, the violence operates on a day-to-day level, continuously intimidating those students who are not committed to violence as a way of life.

Wells said the schools are attempting to improve their security in order to provide a safe environment for students, but added that educational methods such as counseling, the use of social workers, and child-guidance centers will take longer to have an impact.

"The problems are not going to go away," Wells said. "We are going to have to establish limits on what is acceptable and unacceptable behavior."