EQUITY IN DISCIPLINE

Exploring California’s new proposed limits on student suspension and expulsion

BY ALYSSA YANG

Out-of-school suspension has existed as a form of student discipline since the 1960s, but new state legislation may see the next step in its decline. According to Fremont High School English teacher and English Department Lead Camila Torres, California Senate Bill 274 comes in the wake of statewide sentiment — including her personal opinion — that suspension should give way to more restorative forms of student discipline.

“You don’t get suspended in your regular job for mouthing off to your boss or to coworkers, so it’s not a real world consequence,” Torres said. “It doesn’t teach students anything that is actually useful in any way. It just teaches them what behavior is allowed and what behavior is not, and at that point, it’s too animalistic for me.”

SB 274, proposed by Senator Nancy Skinner and currently waiting to be considered by the state Appropriations Committee, could change that. SB 274 would prohibit school administration from suspending or expelling students for “willful defiance” in public and other FUHSD schools such as MVHS, she acknowledges that FHS and FUHSD view suspension as a severe disciplinary measure. Principal Ben Clausnitzer agrees, noting that these beliefs lie behind MVHS’ policies for student discipline.

“There’s a lot of negatives about suspension, so we try to think a little bit [differently] about it,” Clausnitzer said. “If a student makes a bad decision, let’s focus on the behavior. If there needs to be a consequence, you don’t just talk about the consequence — let’s talk about the learning and let’s get the student the support they need.”

Homestead High School senior Dan Penalosa believes suspensions deprive students of the opportunity to participate in school and should be limited to extreme circumstances, such as violence and drug or weapon possession. She welcomes SB 274 as a much-needed change to keep school administration accountable for equity in terms of disciplinary action.

“I believe that the district should be doing more to protect their students, and to actually expel students who are, say, abusing other students or just [inflicting] violence [on] other students,” Penalosa said. “But when it’s at the district’s discretion, and [they] have the choice to expel or suspend or just to use other disciplinary actions, I feel like [they] have no place in suspending students who don’t deserve suspensions.”

Recent research shows that in California, suspensions affect Hispanic and Black students disproportionately. According to Penalosa, similar trends exist within FUHSD, which they attribute to implicit bias. For instance, reports by the Civil Rights Data Collection found that in 2017, 41% of HHS’ out-of-school suspensions were given to Hispanic students, who only made up 25% of the overall student body. Likewise, in 2018, 6% of HHS’ Hispanic student population were suspended, compared to a state

“Any system in general needs to be looked at for this kind of institutional bias that might exist, whether it’s unintentional or intentional,” Clausnitzer said. “[SB 274 is] trying to think about a system that has disproportionately affected marginalized communities and is trying to think about changing that system. I don’t think [SB 274] would affect how students are behaving or schools trying to respond to that behavior. I think it’s about getting the support that students need and focusing on learning.” scared of admin in general, which is a good thing.”

On the other hand, Penalosa says SB 274 would reduce the fear in students’ relationships with school administration.

Torres says that perception of discriminatory discipline at FHS has created divisions not just between students and administration, but also between the entire student body. She recalls students describing how the FHS campus is segregated during free periods, with white and Asian students on one half, and Black and Latinx students on the other. However, she worries that SB 274 could actually make systemic bias worse by allowing critics to argue that the law enables students to behave even more disruptively, thus drawing attention to SB 274 and away from the equity issue itself.

“The problem [is] that putting more laws in place actually also doesn’t get

in San Jose Unified reported discipline inequity

*According to ABC7 in 2021 to the root of the ‘why’ [of systemic bias], so I think that [we are] still very widely missing the mark,” Torres said. “[SB 724 is] almost a shield for teachers to say, ‘This law passed. Now everybody is even more rude. I don’t feel safe in my classroom.’ That’s a very reactionary way to look at what’s happening, because it’s not getting to the root of the cause. It’s only looking at the actual behavior. So it could actually do more damage than good in that way.”

Clausnitzer, Penalosa and Torres all emphasize the importance of speaking with students to address behavioral issues, in lieu of turning directly to disciplinary action. Torres in particular suggests that administrators could place more emphasis on building community structures within schools, in order to provide all students with support networks they can rely on.

“[For] a lot of the students that