Dive Brief:
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Black girls are disciplined more often and more harshly than other girls, and they have the highest rates of exclusionary discipline like suspensions and expulsions, according to a Government Accountability Office report released last week. Black girls are disciplined at higher rates in every state nationwide.
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Despite accounting for only 15% of all girls in public schools, Black girls received almost half of the suspensions and expulsions in the 2017-18 school year. Black girls also received harsher punishments than White girls even when their infractions — such as defiance, disrespect and disruption — were similar.
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Factors contributing to the discipline disparities include a biased view of Black girls as older and more promiscuous than their peers, colorism, and gender stereotypes like traditional expectations of femininity, according to GAO's review of research.
Dive Insight:
In 2022, Members of the House tasked GAO, a congressional watchdog that investigates federal spending and performance, with reviewing the effects of disciplinary policies and practices for girls in public schools.
"How students are treated in schools can profoundly influence their experiences and have a lingering effect into adulthood," FAO said in a letter on the report to Democratic Reps. Rosa DeLauro, Nancy Pelosi, and Ayanna Pressley, who requested the study. "Recent federal data show that many girls are struggling across almost all measures of well-being — including substance use, experiences of violence, mental health, and suicidal thoughts and behaviors."
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, teen girls felt twice as persistently sad and hopeless as boys did in 2021. Nearly 1 in 3 teen girls considered attempting suicide, and 1 in 5 said they had experienced sexual violence in the preceding year, CDC found.
CDC recommended that schools foster school connectedness, among other solutions, to address worsening student mental health. Students who feel more connected to their school are more likely to earn higher grades and test scores, less likely to engage in risky behaviors, and less apt to experience emotional distress and thoughts of suicide in the teen years, according to the agency.
However, the GAO report found that Black girls reported feeling less safe and less connected to their schools than other groups of girls. Black girls, for example, were more likely than White girls to say they were afraid of being attacked on school property, and they were more likely than White or Asian girls to disagree that teachers at their school treat students with respect. Black girls also reported feeling more frequently that school rules were unfair.
GAO researchers also interviewed young women ages 18-24 about their K-12 experiences, and what they learned mirrored the data reviewed, according to Jackie Nowicki, director of GAO's Education, Workforce, and Income Security division.
"And it showed us that the girls themselves are aware that even when they behave similarly
to their peers or perform well academically, they may be treated differently at school because of their race and their gender," Nowicki said during a Sept. 19 podcast on the report's findings. "So, there are educational consequences, economic consequences, and emotional consequences, and physical consequences for girls' safety and well-being."
A 2020 study led by a Princeton University researcher showed that teachers are not less likely than those in other professions to harbor explicit and implicit bias toward Black people. Last year, a small study of one diverse California district showed that extensive use of referrals by a small group of teachers contributed significantly to discipline gaps between Black and White students.
Targeted support and interventions for such teachers may help reduce biases, both studies found.
