Page 37 - Journal 89-3 Full

Rethinking Exclusionary Practices

By Stacy Reeves

Children of color are disproportionately removed from the classroom-learning environment. They
are suspended and expelled more than their peers for similar incidences. Many children do not
know how to resolve conflict with their peers. Two possible solutions are to keep children in the
classroom and to teach social-emotional learning skills.

ecently, I taught an elementary education classroom management class at my
Runiversity utilizing a new text selected for the course. The previous text focused
on management strategies such as response-cost token systems, proximity control,
and other related concepts that have been taught in these courses for years. The
newly selected text focused on completely different topics, including inequalities
in discipline of children of color and zero-tolerance policies that often discriminate
against children who are Black or Brown or living below the poverty line. Preparing
for class each week to address these topics in 2022 was eye-opening and more than
a little disheartening. Even though I have known about these concepts for years, it
had been a long time since I had researched these inequities for current-day teaching
purposes. Aged problems of inequity that continue to be problematic include the
following facts.

Problematic Facts
Problematic Fact One: Disproportiate Office Referrals, Suspensions,
and Expulsions Occur for Students of Color and Those Who Live Below
the Poverty Line
Most teachers would say that they are fair and treat all children in the same
ways regardless of a child’s personal characteristics, but research points out some
difficult-to-deal-with facts.
For decades, students of color and/or with disabilities are disproportionately
referred to their school principal’s office for disciplinary infractions, and
they are similarly disproportionately suspended, referred by and to law
enforcement, put in alternative school programs, and expelled. Critically,
many of these students’ original behavioral offenses are minor disruptions
like ‘disrespect,’ ‘defiance,’ ‘talking back,’ and ‘refusal to comply’—
disruptions that result in student-teacher conferences for White students,
but office discipline referrals for students of color and/or with disabilities.
(Knoff, 2022, para. 1).
A connection exists between school suspension rates and students’ characteristics
such as family economic status and race (Raffaele-Mendez et al., 2002). Inequality
is an ongoing, decades-long problem. Gordon (2018) stated that the “2013–14 Civil
Rights Data Collection (CRDC) documented that Black students, who make up 16
percent of enrollment, accounted for 40 percent of suspensions nationally” (para. 1).
A study drawing on data from 2000 to 2013 in Louisiana showed that Black students
were more likely to be referred to the office and suspended or expelled than their
White counterparts (Barrett et al., 2017). Barrett et al. (2017) stated that a Black or
Brown child living below the poverty line is 10% more likely to be suspended than
a White child also below the poverty line in the same school, grade level, and year.

Educators’ Choice 35