#1 Rethinking Justice in the Classroom: In 2025, communities are redefining justice beyond punishment and policing. Restorative justice centers the harmed person without punishment and can help students understand impact, not just face consequences. Why the student stole Ms. Dawson’s collectible is technically unknown.
#2 Understanding Root Causes: Transformative justice digs deeper, asking why harm happens. Some steal for survival, others out of frustration. Both exist within broken systems that underpay teachers, over-police youth, and fail to meet basic needs.
#3 The Pipeline Starts With Perception: The school-to-prison pipeline disproportionately impacts Black students at the literal level. But there’s the sociocultural backdrop, too. Whether causing harm or not, Black youth are adultified and viewed as “soon-to-be” adult criminals instead of youth worth engaging with and saving. When paired with social media, dangerous narratives spread.
#4 Spectacle & Surveillance : On platforms like TikTok, millions view and comment on teachers’ content about their students. What happens when students see what the world is saying about them? Their intelligence? Capabilities?
This isn’t new. In the 1850s, police displayed mugshots in public “rogues’ galleries” for entertainment. Today, digital spectatorship has replaced the gallery but not the gaze.
Ultimately, this case was left up to the school. The collectible is gone. But will the student truly grasp the impact of their actions? Will teachers and students alike feel safe in their classrooms? Let’s view this viral debate as an opportunity to ask questions. Prisons and policing don’t effectively prevent crime. These systems, entrenched in most everyday institutions, offer punitive responses to preexisting damage. It’s time to imagine something better.