Students' rights of freedom of association and expression are also at stake. Generally, educational institutions provide an opportunity for protected association, and school officials must have the discretion to keep the police from their students, to maintain their school's academic culture, and to meet the duties delegated to them by parents. Rights of association and expression are obviously affected by the presence of an intrusive security force with law enforcement powers. Students may be dissuaded from associating with those who are perceived by the security police to be troublemakers, or those who may be singled out because of their race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation, for fear that they, too, will be subject to increased scrutiny. We are concerned also about parental rights.
Parents delegate the task of educating their children to the state for limited purposes.
The placement of police-trained and supervised security force in public schools exceeds the authority parents grant to the state for educational purposes, and interferes with their rights to discipline their children. School officials remain free to request police assistance in response to the particular needs of their school at a particular time. A constant and continuous police presence in public schools will cause more constitutional and civil liberties harm than it will benefit safety.