Education Week - September 1, 2021 - 24

OPINION
INSIDE
20
Will the Pandemic Produce
A New, Bolder Teacher?
| WEIGHING THE RESEARCH
Why, Really, Are So Many
Black Kids Suspended?
R
acial disparities in
disciplinary suspensions
of students from
school have acquired
greater significance
given the substantial
disruptions, including
widening gaps in achievement, caused by
COVID-19. These disparities were well
documented before the onset of the pandemic.
In 2015-16, when students lost 11 million
days of instruction from suspensions, Black
students lost nearly five times the number of
days as white students. Some studies suggest
similar disparities for Latinx students in some
locations and schooling levels.
At some point in history, educational
stakeholders apparently became comfortable
with school discipline resembling the criminaljustice
system. Common misconceptions
about the root cause of discipline disparities
continue to support this stance. Yet a robust
school discipline research base counters
these misconceptions and provides some
vetted alternative approaches to exclusionary
discipline policies.
One popular misconception is that
differences in student behavior by race
account for a large proportion of the gap in
suspensions. However, as Shafiqua Little of
Research for Action and I found in a systematic
review of the research, studies have largely
dispelled the notion that racial differences in
exclusionary discipline are due to either higher
rates of involvement in misbehavior or more
severe misbehavior among Black students.
Another widespread misconception is
that student socioeconomic status drives
differences in who receives exclusionary
discipline, with poor children more likely to be
suspended. Several studies show that poverty
at either the student or school level does
not solely explain the rates of exclusionary
discipline. At all socioeconomic levels, Black
students are more likely to be suspended than
white students.
Instead, discipline disparities are better
explained by the behavior of adults-teachers,
assistant principals, and principals-in schools
than by student misbehavior or poverty. Less
severe infractions make up the majority of
disciplinary referrals to the school office,
but teachers refer Black and white students
differently for the same level of misbehavior.
White students are referred more than
Black students for objective behaviors (for
example, smoking, vandalism, leaving without
permission, and obscene language), and
Black students are referred more than white
students for subjective behaviors (for example,
defiance of authority, disrespect, excessive
By Richard O. Welsh
WELSH is an assistant professor of education leadership and policy studies at the Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development, New York University. Welsh's areas of expertise
include the economics of education and K-12 education policy analysis. This essay is part of a series that aims to put the pieces of research together for education decisionmakers.
24 | EDUCATION WEEK | September 1, 2021 | www.edweek.org/opinion
than crafting the school culture to fit the
social, emotional, and cultural needs of
students. The programs lead schools to focus
more on achieving behavior management
through conformity and less on addressing the
cultural clashes that may be driving discipline
disparities. To date, interventions have given
insufficient attention to issues of race and
culture and have focused predominantly on
student misbehavior.
Some bright spots do appear in this
evidence base. School discipline reforms that
reduce office disciplinary referrals for Black
students, including programs encompassing
culturally responsive practices and enhanced
classroom-management strategies, have
the potential to reduce racial inequality
in suspensions. For example, infusing
Restorative Practice and PBIS with culturally
responsive teaching practices shows promise
in reducing suspensions for Black students.
Programs such as GREET-STOP-PROMPT
noise, threat, and loitering).
Why do these racial differences in
disciplinary referrals and suspensions exist?
Recent evidence suggests that classroom- and
school-level factors play a role. When Black
students have a Black teacher, they have
lower rates of suspensions and expulsions, but
despite growing student diversity, the teaching
workforce remains largely white.
Teacher responses to misbehavior may be
attributable to teachers' racial perceptions and
bias. Teachers as a group are more likely to
deem students' behavior harmful or indicative
of a harmful pattern when those students
are Black. Similarly, misconduct from Black
students is punished more harshly than the
same misconduct from white students.
School characteristics such as a higher
percentage of Black students and lower
average school achievement make the
probability of out-of-school suspension or
expulsion greater and partly explain disparities
in discipline. Principals differ in their approach
to discipline, and these variations influence
suspension rates as well. Some evidence
also suggests that students' and teachers'
perceptions of the racial climate at schools can
explain discipline disparities.
Several alternative approaches to
exclusionary discipline policies and practices
have emerged. Program-based approaches
such as Positive Behavior Interventions and
Supports (PBIS) and Restorative Practices
try to both improve school culture broadly
and provide school personnel with skills in
behavior management and student discipline.
Policy-based approaches focus on changing
school and district responses to misbehavior
by, for example, restricting the use of
suspension in elementary grades for subjective
offenses like incivility or disorderly conduct.
Yet while many programs appear to decrease
suspension rates, racial disparities persist.
Even studies published in the past five years
have found that the benefits of program-based
interventions do not appear, on average,
to have greater benefits for Black students.
Additionally, although social and emotional
learning is viewed by many as a way to curb
student misbehavior, there is little empirical
research examining SEL as an effective way to
address rates of discipline or to end racial or
ethnic disparities.
And all told, a majority of programs in
our systematic review focused on helping
students assimilate to school culture rather
or training on cultural responsiveness
coupled with classroom coaching for
teachers (such as Double Check cultural
responsivity and student engagement
coaching) have reduced referrals for Black
students. MyTeachingPartner, a program that
focuses on improving classroom climate and
teacher support for students, also appears to
narrow the racial gap in discipline. Helping
teachers adopt an empathic mindset reduced
disciplinary referrals overall. Many programs
that have been effective center their efforts
on teacher coaching and staff professional
development, suggesting that supporting
teachers and school leaders is pivotal to
reducing racial inequality in suspensions.
The underlying causes of the disparities
in disciplinary outcomes are, in many ways,
byproducts of larger issues in K-12 schooling,
such as a lack of workforce diversity, weak
classroom management, and shortfalls in
the cultural capability of teachers. Given
this, there is no silver bullet. Instead,
strategic coordination of various alternative
approaches to exclusionary discipline is
critical, as these levers work in tandem to
dismantle disparities. Policies prohibiting
suspensions for less severe offenses, for
example, can be coupled with a school-based
program such as Restorative Practices and
augmented by professional development
on classroom management and culturally
responsive practices for teachers and school
leaders.
And whatever the pathway toward
improvement, honest conversations about
the role of race and culture in education
and society are precursors to solving the
conundrum. n
21
Yes, Kindergartners
Can Thrive on Zoom
22
Letters to
the Editor
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Education Week - September 1, 2021

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