Kids, School & Discipline

​A new report from the Council of State Governments Justice Center and Texas A&M University’s Public Policy Research Institute that is being hailed as an unprecedented look at discipline in schools, shows that there are wide varieties in discipline methods among very similar schools, and even schools that were nearly identical suspended and expelled their students at very different rates. The comprehensive report goes against the common perception that the only way schools can manage behavior is through suspension because so many different schools have shown they can get different results with very similar student bodies. The findings support the idea that school discipline is not just a reflection of the students, and that the administrators and teachers can also have a dramatic impact on the results.
 
The research analysis used more than 80 variables, including race, economics, test scores, attendance, teacher salary and experience, and expenditures per student to show that while some schools in high-poverty areas suspended students at very high rates, other schools with similar student bodies did not. Schools in more prosperous suburban and rural areas displayed the same discipline gap, as some employed harsh discipline, and others with nearly identical qualities did not.
 
The study looked at 6.6 million records of every Texas seventh-grader in 2000, 2001 and 2002 and tracked them for the next six years or more. When the education data was compared to juvenile justice records, it showed a definite connection between the classroom and the courtroom that has sometimes been referred to as the school-to-prison pipeline. The study found that 23% of those students who had been suspended at least once also had contact with the juvenile justice system. In comparison, a mere 2% of those students without suspensions had some involvement with the juvenile justice system. The study result confirm that suspension and expulsion both increased a student’s risk of being held back a grade, dropping out altogether, or ending up in the juvenile justice system.
 
Because the more kids are involved with discipline at school, the greater their risk of involvement at the criminal justice level, many people believe that the whole system of school discipline is broken because too many students are suspended for typical teenage lapses. The theory is backed up by the fact that while a whopping 97% of disciplined students got in trouble for discretionary offenses like classroom disruption and insubordination, only 3% were suspended for serious violations like bringing weapons or drugs to school. Suspension has become the default discipline tool because it is easier than actually working one-on-one with kids to improve their behavior at school.
 
While the Texas study found 60% of the students in the analysis had been disciplined with suspension or juvenile justice programs at some point from the seventh grade on, many educators are now pointing to better classroom management and alternative discipline approaches as the better long-term solutions.