Proposal on the Prevention
and Alternatives to Suspension and Expulsion
Introduction:
The Forum on Race, Equity and Human Understanding
applauds Superintendent Dr. John A. Maloy and the
Monroe County School Corporation for declaring diversity
as one of its highest priorities. The fact that Human
Understanding and Diversity resides among the school
corporation’s four pillars demonstrates a strong
commitment to serving the needs of all of the students,
families, teachers and community members of the school
district.
While it has only been three years since its inception,
the MCCSC has made solid strides in its advancement
of Human Understanding and Diversity. Such strides
include:
The formation of the Advisory Committee for Human
Understanding and Diversity. The Advisory Committee
released a report regarding the recruitment and retention
of people of color, sensitivity, professional development
and curriculum.
The establishment of HU&D committees in every
school building and central office.
The hiring of several trainers and diversity experts,
Shana Ritter, Jeff Harlig, and Daniel Baron, to work
with the MCCSC staff and administration to create
cultural awareness and establish cultural competency
throughout the district.
Participation in the 2004 Bloomington Commission
on the Status of Black Males Town Hall Meeting on
Race, School Discipline and Criminal Justice. The
public forum directly led to the MCCSC establishment
of Forum Race, Equity and Human Understanding.
This school year, the MCCSC also established HU&D
building coaches to support the work that continues
in each building. Nearly 60 staff members and administrators
are participating in on-going HU&D training that
kicked off in Oct. 2005. The goal for 2005-2006 is
to create a common language and to continue thoughtful
dialogue and activities that promote cultural competency.
The continuation of HU&D Community Days, allowing
the district to dialogue with the community and view
the work and growth that is occurring in each building.
The next HU&D Community Day is 6:30 p.m., Thursday,
Dec. 8 at South High School.
As an outgrowth of Human Understanding and Diversity
efforts, the Forum strongly encourages and supports
Dr. Maloy and the MCCSC in its quest for change and
vision to provide all students, especially students
of color and diversity, with access, opportunities
and educational environment needed to succeed.
The Forum:
As a direct outgrowth of the 2004 Bloomington Commission
on the Status of Black Males Town Hall Meeting and
the MCCSC’s Human Understanding and Diversity
efforts, the Forum on Race, Equity and Human Understanding
established its mission:
To address the expressed community concerns, regarding
the school experiences of students of diversity (difference)
and their parents and to recommend positive changes
in those practices that impede student success.
The Recommendations:
The Forum opened its deliberations twice to public
input, once for open-ended comments and then for roundtable
discussions. Our focus coincided with the original
focus of the Town Hall Meeting: Prevention and Alternatives
to Suspension and Expulsion. The following proposal
is distilled from those meetings as well as many months
of challenging dialogue among the forum members and
community participants.
The Forum believes the greatest priority is to provide
students with a school environment that drastically
minimizes the necessity for resorting to suspension
or expulsion. Suspensions and expulsions hold negative
outcomes for all students. This means that the best
solution to the problem of racial disparities in administration
of disciplinary policies and practices is through
prevention and a creating a nurturing a school climate
that promotes a sense of ownership, belonging and
involvement on the part of all students and families.
Section A: Alternatives to
Suspension & Expulsion
- Review of Board Policy - The community needs for
a long-overdue review and examination board policy,
guidelines, practices relating to suspension and
expulsion hearings. Such a review should include
public input, legal advice and debate. An awareness
campaign also should be established to generate
a better understanding of disciplinary procedures,
especially throughout our communities of color.
Parents also want to be assured of inclusion in
the decision-making process earlier in the disciplinary
process, before suspensions are imposed. When an
expulsion hearing is inevitable, parents and students
need support to navigate a potentially intimidating
process and evaluate options, in the interest of
assuring due process. If allowed by law, legal counsel
or an advocate should be allowed in the hearing
process.
- Expanding Current Alternatives - Remediation and
counseling (development of emotional intelligence,
decision-making skills, conflict resolution and
anger management) should be part of the response
to discipline problems. If suspension is inevitable,
then in-house suspension with full responsibility
for work missed is greatly preferable to any other
of the more isolating alternatives.
a. The Youth Outreach model in use at the Teen
Learning Center should be available to high school
students, who would benefit equally by the individual
approach and the combination of geographic separation,
instruction and counseling.
b. The Aurora Alternative School option should
be better publicized to students and families.
c. The Jukebox program should be expanded to
be available even for serious offenses, to avoid
loss of time and difficulties at reintegration.
The provision of assignments for Jukebox attendees
is essential and must be highly organized and
maintained throughout their attendance period.
- New alternatives: Mediation in conflict, victim-offender
reconciliation, community service and other consequences
that closely fit the offense should be integrated
into the response repertoire as alternatives to
the rejection and isolation of expulsion.
- Clear reduction goals: Reducing
the number of suspensions and expulsions must be
given highest priority by top-level administrators,
and mechanisms must be in place to monitor progress.
Without an adequate structure in place to make them
work, goals cannot be met effectively.
a. Only with clearly defined goals are evaluation
and research made possible. The reduction rate
could be set by annual percent, e.g., 5% annual
reduction expected the first year.
b. Reduction rates also must be set with regard
to the disparities in the application of disciplinary
practices between Caucasian students and students
of color. Statistics from state reports should
be used to measure reduction rates. These state
data, compiled by the Indiana University Center
for Evaluation and Education Policy, can provide
the baseline rates against which progress will
be measured.
c. Rules surrounding discipline data entry and
record keeping must be consistent throughout the
district.
d. When reduction goals are achieved, apply rewards
and recognition. To demonstrate the value placed
on these reduction goals, appropriate incentives
must be built into daily practice; for example,
the district might include effective prevention
practices and lower suspension/expulsion rates
in professional growth and evaluation procedures.
Section B: Prevention through
Improving School Climate
- The work of the Human Understanding and Diversity
must become an organic part of the fabric of school
culture, for everyone at the building level as well
as in the various MCCSC departments and in Central
Administration. If our track record is to improve,
strong leadership from the district administration,
in word and in action, is indispensable. Equity
in education is not a choice but a necessity if
disparities are to be eliminated.
- HU&D membership must include a cross-section
of students, certified and non-certified staff and
community members. Student voice needs to be represented
on all levels and across departments.
- We recognize that trainings for the administrative
leadership have been implemented through the Human
Understanding and Diversity initiative. Ongoing
professional development in the area of diversity
needs to continue, extending to all MCCSC personnel,
students and parents.
- The work of HU&D should be directly related
to the needs expressed by students and families,
staff and community. Some of the parental and community
concerns expressed to The Forum include:
a. Welcoming climate. So far
as is possible, certified and support staff should
make every effort to learn and use students’
names; the practice of greeting students
daily need not be limited to the elementary
schools – older students will respond to
this personal approach.
b. Small school concept. Create
community in the secondary schools by developing
advisory groups (e.g., Jackson
Creek) with a small student/staff ratio that meet
regularly, establish trusting relationships and
peer advisories, and assure that all students
know there is an adult looking out for them. Structures
that are already in place but underutilized should
be developed in support of the district’s
efforts to eliminate bias and discrimination in
the schools. Examples of structures that might
lend themselves to such growth are: the Lifeskills
curriculum, the Ophelia Project on Relational
Aggression, the high schools’ Seminar and
SRT hours, etc.
c. Increase adult presence. Involve
community members, Commissioners, non-certified
staff, business, mentors, visitors, presenters,
etc., to create that “village” mentality
in which everyone is looking out for everyone’s
children and the students feel well cared for. Promote
“shadow your son/daughter” and “shadow
your parent/mentor” days. Community adult
involvement needs to be integrated into the daily
routine of school life such that it contributes
positively rather than interrupts or disrupts. Schools
that have had previous successes in this area (i.e.,
Big Brothers Big Sisters’ “Friends Learn
with Me” and Title I “Community Partners
in Reading” program) provide opportunities
for observation and cross-system training to disseminate
these methods and procedures.
d. Student Investment. Foster
greater student responsibility for self, for other
individuals and for the community. The MCCSC visit
to Vermont prompts this recommendation. The Forum
rests believes that students who have a vested and
significant role in co-creating the learning community
are students who feel ownership of their environment
and who work consciously to support it. Such a community
requires few rules and sees few breaches of those
rules. Everyone shares responsibility for keeping
the schools safe and welcoming. MCCSC leadership
must involve students in decision-making and in
sharing responsibility for their behavior and the
behavior of others.
e. Communicate with the Community.
Keep all members of the community well informed.
Use the local media and community partnerships to
publicize and repeat regularly information, expectations
and regulations by which all must abide. Educate
the whole community regarding practices and policies
in the schools. Do not expect that all parents can
or want to come to the schools; take the message
out to the community through clubs, the workplace,
community centers and churches. MCCSC and the Forum
must hold student and parent focus groups, where
they feel they can risk being honest about their
experiences and feelings. Invite not only at-risk
students but also a representative sample.
f. Teachers and Principals Talk to Parents
Early and Often. Early positive communication
with the home should be expected. Teachers should
be expected to make a positive contact with parents
soon after classes begin to establish the beginnings
of on-going communication. Particular attention
should be paid to supporting and training teachers
to communicate directly and effectively with parents.
MCCSC leaders must provide the training time and
the implementation time necessary for this type
of communication to occur with any regularity. Communication
takes time and persistent effort. When problems
occur, no matter how small, the school should inform
families early and often; involve them immediately
to collaborate on the response and to help form
the plan for changing the behavior or situation
that gave rise to the problem.
When such notice is given, parents
too must respond in a timely fashion,
by phone or school visits, to demonstrate to students
that school and home are collaborating to support
them and effect improvement.
g. Peer expertise. Provide opportunities
for professional development among peers by inviting
administrators with “good track records”
– low suspension/expulsion numbers, good attendance,
and effective classroom management – to share
their experiences with other administrators. The
building-level Human Understanding and Diversity
committees could provide the venue for such peer-to-peer
sharing of successes. The HU&D should periodically
publish these in-house “best practices.”
h. Enhance Community Partnerships.
Utilize non-profit agencies in Monroe County that
offer a wide variety of resources, services, and
professional development trainers in the areas of
conflict resolution and prevention. Youth Services
Bureau, Center for Evaluation & Education Policy,
Community Justice and Mediation, IU, Ivy Tech etc.,
are examples of organizations are willing to partner
with the MCCSC.
The Forum understands that systemic change takes
time, not only in the sense of the months and years
required for change to become firmly established,
but also in the sense of the hours and days required
to work towards change. However, it is essential now
that time, resources and funding be wisely allocated,
within today’s lamentably tight education budget,
to support diversity work. It is vital to give teachers,
students and support staff release time during regular
school hours to bring about lasting change. It is
important that Human Understanding and Diversity efforts
never viewed as supplemental, add-ons, or extra-curricular
activities. Any cultural growth in the MCCSC, in order
to be lasting, must continue to be interwoven into
the fabric of the daily operations of our schools.
Human Understanding and Diversity forever be viewed
as more than an opportunity for our schools to improve,
but as the responsibility of our schools to improve.
The Forum looks forward to your response to the aforementioned
recommendations and a new year working partnering
with the MCCSC to foster educational success for all
students of color and diversity.
