Dive Brief:
- According to new maps of 2011-12 discipline data released by the U.S. Department of Education, location matters in how likely a student is to get suspended.
- Some school districts have suspension rates of more than 25%, while others are close to zero.
- Southeastern states, as well as Western border states, have higher concentrations of districts with high suspension rates.
Dive Insight:
Suspensions and expulsions tend to disproportionately impact students with disabilities and minority students. Last year, the Obama administration released a set of guidelines intended to scale back suspensions as a disciplinary tool. At a Wednesday conference about school discipline, education officials announced their intention to help educators seek out alternatives, including a federal resource center developed under the supervision of the Department of Justice.
“Too often, so-called zero-tolerance policies, however well intentioned they might be, make students feel unwelcome in their own schools; they disrupt the learning process,” former Attorney General Eric Holder said last year, according to the Huffington Post reports.