Blacks Comprise Majority of School Suspensions (172 hits)
About 40 percent of students who were suspended were black, according to a Department of Education report
A Department of Education report revealed what many people have always suspected: Black students receive a disproportionate number of out of school suspensions. In Tennessee, for example, black students were four times more likely to be suspended than other students.
Nine middle schools in Nashville had suspended half of their black students at some point, according to the report. Six elementary schools suspended only black students.
In 2007, Jerre Middle School in Nashville suspended 60 percent of its African-American male students. Another suspended 58 percent of its black male students but just 10 percent of its white male students, and a third suspended 58 percent of black boys, but only 13 percent of white boys.
In a recent panel discussion with Michel Martin on NPR’s “Tell Me More,” school Principal David Martin (no relation) said the reasons for the disparities were complex, but largely rooted in cultural differences.
“I think there are some cultural issues that needed to be addressed in the school and still need to be addressed in school, actually, regarding the ways in which teachers perceive cultural differences and cultural reactions that are based, not only in ethnicity, but also in poverty,” Martin said.
Martin said suspensions and expulsions have been cut by more than half in the past three years by taking a more community-wide approach, partnering with agencies to get help for students and their families and better training for teachers.
While there may be some implicit bias in suspension rates, Maury Nation, an associate professor of human and organizational development at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, warned against an assumption that school officials are out to get black youth.
“Number one, if you look at the national statistics, boys have always been much more likely to be suspended than girls. I think the other thing is that the potential for a black male student's behavior to be perceived as threatening when it's unfamiliar,” Nation said in the same interview.
Nation, whose research focuses on preventing violence and bullying among school age children, also works with the Nashville Public School system – including Jerre Middle School – to help counter the high suspension rates, especially among African-American youth.
Experts say that discipline problems also mirror achievement scores. Children with discipline issues also tend to do more poorly in school, a problem intensified by suspensions which keep students out of school and away from learning.
The American Civil Liberties Union has said part of the blame can be placed on the No Child Left Behind Act which, in many ways, had the opposite effect.
“As a result of test-based accountability regimes such as the No Child Left Behind Act, schools have an incentive to push out low-performing students to boost overall test scores,” the ACLU said in a statement. “One study found that schools meted out longer suspensions to students who performed poorly on standardized tests than to high-performing students for similar offenses. This ‘punishment gap grew substantially during the period of time when standardized tests were administered, indicating that schools .....
