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EGACY Yesterday. Today. Tomorrow.

WEDNESDAYS • March 4, 2015

INSIDE

The twin evils - 6 Finally, compensation - 9 Talk of menopause - 14 New voice of business - 15 LEGACYNEWSPAPER.COM • FREE

Suspended. Are schools closing the discipline gap? The overall numbers, however, mask huge racial disparities that exist in a relatively small number of school districts across the country. For example, schools in the area in and around St. Louis, Mo., which erupted in racial riots following the fatal shooting of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown by a white policeman last year, are among the worst in the country when it comes to the unequal treatment of black and white students. Khalid Caraballo (left) and a friend were in 7th grade in 2013 when they were suspended from their Virginia Beach school for playing with an airsoft gun in his front yard as they waited for the school bus. The children were suspended for possession, handling and use of a firearm. irginia middle-schooler suspended for confiscating razor from self-harming student. A seventh grader in Virginia and his friend suspended from school for shooting an airsoft gun… in his front yard. A couple of second grade students at a Virginia elementary school suspended for two days after violating the school’s “zero tolerance” policy on weapons. The weapons in question? Pencils. Such are some of recent headlines capturing the state and nation’s reliance on student suspensions to maintain discipline in public schools. A new analysis has found that U.S. children are losing almost 18 million days of instruction due to high suspension rates. It looks at discipline in public schools, how it varies dramatically across the 50 states, as well as identifying the

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individual districts with the most egregious records. “Are We Closing the School Discipline Gap?”, for the first time breaks out federal data by elementary and secondary schools, and combines all out-of-school suspensions to calculate comparative suspension rates for every district in the nation. Florida takes the lead in this dubious category. It suspended 5.1 percent of its elementary students and 19 percent of its secondary students just in 2011-12, the latest data available. At the elementary level, Florida was followed by Mississippi and Delaware, each suspending 4.8 percent of their students. At the secondary level, Florida was followed by Alabama, Mississippi and South Carolina, each reporting a suspension rate of 16 percent.

In Virginia, black male students are twice as likely to be suspended from public schools as their white peers. Suspensions in Virginia are often given for minor misconduct such as talking loudly and disrupting class and that black students are 67 percent more likely than white students to be suspended for offenses involving disruption or disrespect. “Are We Closing the School Discipline Gap” was conducted by the Center for Civil Rights Remedies at the UCLA Civil Rights Project. While K-12 data reported by the nation’s more than 12,000 school districts was released last year, the U.S. Department of Education has never attempted the type of statistical breakout made possible by the UCLA center. “‘Are we closing the school discipline gap?’ For the first time, we can answer that question in a

really meaningful way,” said Daniel J. Losen, the director of the Center for Civil Rights Remedies. “And the answer is, ‘A lot of school districts are closing the gap in a profound way, but not enough to swing the national numbers.’” Losen said the data clearly show that more than half of the nation’s school districts treat removal from the classroom as a last resort and have relatively low suspension rates. But many of the higher-suspending districts literally are off the chart, he added. “The fact that 14 percent of districts suspended more than one of every 10 black elementary students, and 21 percent of the districts suspended one of every four black secondary students, is shocking when compared to the Latino and white distribution,” said Losen. Henrico County Schools which responded to the analysis results, notes that the rate of suspensions in the division decreased from 31 percent to 13.8 percent during that time. Suspensions of black students were down 29 percent; suspensions of Hispanic students decreased 16 percent; and suspensions of white students were down 8 percent. “We’ve made real progress with initiatives, training and the hard work of our staff,” said Patrick C. Kinlaw, the division’s superintendent. “There are more supports currently in place so that inappropriate behavior is addressed as early possible or avoided altogether. “With the support of our school board, we have reallocated financial, human and material resources in order to help more students (continued on page 4)


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