Featured Speaker: Michael Schwartz, Founder, Safety Valve ProjectMichael Schwartz is an attorney in Savannah. His practice focuses on defending individuals whose conduct has been misunderstood by people in positions of power. He defends against allegations ranging from possession of controlled substances to murder. He is a veteran of the Georgia Capital Defender and the United States Air Force JAG Corps.
In 2021, recognizing a pattern in his clients’ lives, he began studying the effects of school suspension and expulsion. With a group of friends, he incorporated a nonprofit organization called the Safety Valve Project, Inc., which exists to provide families (who can't afford it) free assistance in defending against suspension or expulsion before school tribunals.
With the goal of slowing the flow of the school-to-prison pipeline, Safety Valve Project pairs students facing tribunals with defense teams trained to identify biopsychosocial and environmental factors that add context to alleged misconduct. Safety Valve Project builds and funds defense teams to investigate allegations, represent students before tribunals and, if necessary, appeal suspensions and expulsions to school boards, the Board of Education, and appellate courts.
Michael started off by sharing that one of the Air Force values is Service Before Self, and his wife is a yoga teacher, so our 4-way test resonated with him. As a criminal defense lawyer, he errs on the side of “if you can’t say something nice, say something clever and devastating.” He’s passionate about talking with people about service...everything from attending a fundraiser and writing a check, to the one-on-one interactions that directly help individuals and families.
Michael was sitting in Judge Karpf’s court (Suzy’s husband) for a murder trial (not his case) but wanted to learn more from the experience. Seeing the jurors show up, the Public Defenders, etc., he was overwhelmed with the sense of how everyone is trying to operate in these public systems. He’s fully aware that not all of our systems work well for all people. Half of his career specifically was focused on death penalty cases. Since 1973, only 2%-4% of death row inmates have been exonerated. This process is implemented by the highest quality of professionals, and yet we are still getting it wrong up to 4% of the time.
***PSA: challenge your parking ticket once/year and you’ll win every time***
Appeals become incredibly frustrating to all parties. He made an example about “exclusionary discipline” and how that impact has terrible effects not only on the individuals but also on the institution and the families. A young person who is removed from school for more than 10 days is 3 times more likely to have an interaction with law enforcement within the next year. He found a common theme after reviewing a number of cases and found a common thread started with the client being removed from school and ending in his office facing the death penalty. The job became understanding the backstory to what caused the behavior problems in the first place. Michael became tired of being at the end of the line and decided he wanted to be involved at the start of this process. The social science behind all of this demonstrates the pipeline that the youth are run through as a result.
Building the Safety Valve Project started with Michael taking on a case with a 4th grader at Savannah Classical Academy (a school with “Zero Tolerance” at the time, which is against the law in GA.) There are additional flaws with that logic as well. Michael met with the CEO (Principal) of Savannah Classical and was told there was no way to work this out. He wasn’t okay with taking no for an answer, so he called the 4th grader’s family as well as speaking with the other student who was involved in the fight. They employed the services of the Mediation Center and ended up planning a trip to the arcade and had a blast with the boys. Michael had photos from this trip, and presented the trial lawyers with an image of the two boys with their arms around each other! The point being, there are alternative ways to solve problems with a little bit of creativity. In Chatham County, we have a single person hearing officer, so when a student is facing a hearing, they are entitled to counseling. (He noted that our Public Defender office in Chatham is actually staffed with wonderful attorneys.) In the school system, you have a right to counsel, but it’s not funded. Which means that only 2% of these kids show up with a lawyer. This does not bode well for the student and their family.
The goal is to help the under-resourced teacher, but removing the child from the classroom isn’t the best option. There’s a choice to work with the attorneys to identify the “why” behind the behavior and work towards rehabilitation. The social science behind this “third justice system” in GA (the schools) is real and Michael wants us to spread the word about the Safety Valve Project with anyone that you might know who would be a resource.