exclusionary discipline highest in new hampshire-s urban schools

8/20/2019 Exclusionary Discipline Highest in New Hampshire-s Urban Schools

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Exclusionary Discipline Highest in NewHampshire’s Urban Schools

Suspension and Expulsion Found to Disproportionately

Affect Disadvantaged Students

D o u g l a s J . G a g n o n , E l e a n o r M . J a f f e e , a n d R e e v e K e n n e d y

Summary

Exclusionary school discipline—that is, suspensionand expulsion—disproportionately affects alreadydisadvantaged students on both the national andstate levels. In New Hampshire, students attendinglarger urban schools, male students, students o color,students eligible or ree and reduced-price lunch,students with disabilities, and homeless students aremore likely to experience exclusionary school dis-cipline, although racial disparities appear to stemlargely rom the greater racial diversity at the urbanschools that use this type o discipline at higherrates with all students. Previous research indicatesthat exclusionary discipline and the resulting loss oclassroom time is associated with poorer academicoutcomes. Tereore, regardless o the precipitateso exclusionary discipline, it is worth exploring theextent to which exclusionary discipline is experiencedamong New Hampshire students.

Introduction

Exclusionary school discipline reers to any schooldisciplinary practice that isolates students rom theirclassroom environments. In-school suspension (ISS),out-o-school suspension (OSS), and expulsion areall orms o exclusionary discipline. Nationally, in the2009–2010 school year, approximately 7.4 percent o

CARSEYRESEARCH

Regional Issue Brief #46

Winter 2016


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all public school students in kin-dergarten through grade 12 weresuspended at least once, whichtranslates to well over three mil-

lion students.

1

Not all students havean equal likelihood o experienc-ing exclusionary discipline; it isadministered to students o color,2 students with disabilities,3 homelessstudents,4 students eligible or reeand reduced-price lunch (FRL),5 6 male students,7 and students attend-ing urban schools8 at increasing anddisproportionate rates.

Tis research brie ollows up ona joint Carsey/NH Kids Count (or-

merly the NH Children’s Alliance)publication rom 2009.9 Te 2009study ocused on larger disciplinarytrends in New Hampshire schoolsand contextualized them in thepolicies, laws, and procedures thatmay have resulted in increaseduse o exclusionary discipline. Tepresent study reports on rates oexclusionary discipline rom 2010through 2014 by school and studentcharacteristics to better understandhow and to what extent exclusionarydiscipline has been applied acrossthe state in recent years. It does not,however, investigate why exclusion-ary discipline is applied. It doesnot consider, or example, studentbehaviors that precipitate use oexclusionary discipline, schoolpersonnel belies and practices, orschool climate. We cannot conjec-ture based on the available data why

relationships between exclusionarydiscipline and student character-istics exist and persist. Instead, weidentiy and describe these relation-ships, raising important questionsor uture research designed toexplain their root causes.

B o x 1 : D a t a a n d D e f i n i t i o n s

Anonymized State-Assigned Student Identifier (SASID) data were obtainedor this project rom the New Hampshire Department o Education’sPerormancePLUS/i4See Longitudinal Data System.10 Below are definitionso the terms used in our analysis o this dataset.

Definition of Terms

Exclusionary Discipline: Any disciplinary practice that isolates studentsrom their classroom environment; includes in-school suspension, out-o-school suspension, and expulsion.

Expulsion: Permanent denial o a student’s attendance at school.11

FRL Eligibility: Eligibility or ree and reduced-priced lunch, ofen used asa proxy measure o amily income. Students are eligible or ree lunch itheir amily’s household income is up to 130 percent o the ederal povertythreshold ($30,615 annually or a amily o our in the 2013–14 school

year), and or reduced-price lunch up to 185 percent ($43,568 annually).12

High Exclusionary Discipline: A student is considered to experience“high exclusionary discipline” i administered at least 5 days o OSS totaland/or an expulsion in a given school year.

Homeless Student: A student who lacks fixed, regular, and adequatenighttime residence.13

In-School Suspension (ISS): emporary denial o a student’s attendancein classes at school or a specific period o time.

Out-of-School Suspensions (OSS): emporary denial o a student’s atten-dance at school and on school grounds or a specific period o time.14

Student of Color: Any student who does not sel-identiy as white.15

Student with a Disability: A student with an identified disability and anIndividualized Education Plan (IEP).16

otal ISS ime/100 Students: Te number o days o ISS in a year per100 students.

otal OSS ime/100 Students: Te number o days o OSS in a year per100 students.

Definition of Geographic Categories17

Urban: erritory inside an urbanized area (a densely settled core ocensus blocks with a population o 50,000 or more and adjacent denselysettled surrounding areas) and inside a principal city (primary popula-

tion and economic center o a metropolitan area).

Suburban: erritory inside an urbanized area and outside a principal city.

own: erritory outside an urbanized area and inside an urban cluster (adensely settled core o census blocks with a population between 25,000and 50,000 with adjacent densely settled surrounding areas).

Rural: erritory outside an urban cluster.

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Background: Disparities

on the State and National

Levels

In the 1980s and 1990s, rates oexclusionary discipline began toincrease as a result o the widespreadimplementation o so-called “zerotolerance” policies.18 In general, zerotolerance policies mandate predeter-mined discipline or certain offenses,particularly offenses related to weap-ons, alcohol, or drugs.19 Althoughthese policies were intended to deterstudents rom disruptive and dan-gerous behavior, research suggeststhey did not achieve the intendedoutcome.20 Instead, a different trendemerged: the rates o exclusionarydiscipline skyrocketed21 and schoolsshifed to more extreme disciplineor lesser offenses.22

Florida ninth graders rom 2000 to2008, the dropout rate o 16 percentor students with no suspensionscontrasted considerably to that o 53

percent or our or more suspensionsover the course o their high schoolcareer.27 Te numbers vary acrossstates, districts, and schools, but thedramatic relationship between ahigh level o exclusionary disciplineand the likelihood o school dropoutand other poor academic outcomessuch as lower reading achieve-ment test scores28 is documented innumerous studies.

Despite policies developed to

define how and when exclusionaryschool discipline will be applied,the U.S. Department o EducationOffice or Civil Rights has identifieddisparities in its use by race and dis-ability on the national and state lev-els.29 Tese disparities in the use oa disciplinary strategy that deprivesstudents o classroom time may bea contributing actor in the grow-ing achievement gap between whiteand minority, particularly black,students.30 It is not unreasonable toassume that differences in studentbehavior account or disparities indiscipline. However, many studieshave ound that, compared to whitestudents, black students receiveharsher punishments or the sameoffenses.31 32 33 In particular, blackstudents are more likely to receiveOSS or their first “non-violent,non-criminal, non-drug offense”

compared to white students.34 35

Tese non-violent, non-criminal,non-drug offenses are generally themost common as well as the mostsubjective, allowing or the widestdiscretion on the part o teach-ers and administrators, and racialdisparities in disciplinary reactionare greatest or these offenses. Forexample, a study o Massachusetts

schools ound that black and Latinostudents were more likely to be dis-ciplined and almost twice as likelyto receive an OSS (rather than an

ISS) or these subjective offenses. Incontrast, no disparity was ound indiscipline or more severe and moreobjective offenses such as drug orweapon possession.36

Exclusionary discipline is mostrequently used in large urbanschools with high levels o studentpoverty, and these schools also tendto have much higher rates o racialdisproportionality in school disci-pline, while small rural schools with

low poverty rates use exclusionarydiscipline less ofen with less racialdisproportionality.37 Research sug-gests that it is more than just the sizeo larger urban schools driving theirhigher rates o exclusionary disci-pline.38 39A common characteristic ourban schools is a large percentageo students with low socioeconomicstatus,40 which is in turn related tomany other student characteristicsassociated with increased risk oexperiencing exclusionary disciplinesuch as non-white, non-Asian racial/ethnic identification, mental healthdiagnosis,41 low parental involve-ment,42 and cultural misalignmentbetween teachers and students.43 44 It has also been theorized that stu-dents with lower socioeconomic sta-tus are exposed to more violence intheir communities and this impactsthe way they cope with school

stressors. However, more empiricalresearch is needed to determine therelationship between school disci-pline and neighborhood violence.Lower counselor/student ratios45 and poor school climate, which ischaracterized by eatures such as ahigh rate o absenteeism and incon-sistent application o school rules,46 are also associated with higher rates

Researchers have ound that stu-dents subjected to requent exclu-sionary discipline are more likelyto drop out o school, not graduateon time, and become involvedwith the juvenile justice system inwhat has been termed “the schoolto prison pipeline.”

Other unintended consequenceso zero tolerance policies arose aswell. Researchers have ound that

students subjected to requent exclu-sionary discipline are more likelyto drop out o school, not gradu-ate on time, and become involvedwith the juvenile justice system23 inwhat has been termed “the school toprison pipeline.”24 With each suc-cessive suspension, the likelihoodo dropping out o school rises.25 26 For example, in a study that ollowed

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high school students, it was over100 times lower than the reportednational average o 2.7 percent.

Although New Hampshire reports

rates o exclusionary discipline belownational trends, we find that ISS andOSS are by no means rare in thestate. able 1 shows the total num-ber o students who were admin-istered ISS, OSS, and expulsion in2013–2014 or each grade. Tesenumbers show that the proportion oNew Hampshire students experienc-ing exclusionary discipline increasessubstantially at each middle schoolgrade level beore reaching a relative

plateau at the 11 to 12 percent rangeacross the high school years. Tetypes o discipline most requentlyadministered also differed acrossgrade levels: ISS was most com-mon in middle schools, and OSSwas most common in high schools.Expulsion only occurred in grades 8through 12, and very rarely. Due tothe considerably lower rates o both

types o suspensions and the lack ooccurrence o expulsion in elemen-tary schools, this report primarilyocuses on middle and high schools.

However, it is important to note thatthere were 1,390 students in grades1 through 5 (approximately one infify) administered a suspension inthe 2013–2014 school year alone.

Examining trends in exclusionarydiscipline across time, rates o ISS,OSS, and expulsions have remained very consistent between 2010 and2014. Te average rate o studentsexperiencing ISS varied between 4.3percent and 4.7 percent, and OSS

and expulsion rates also varied littleacross years. Te total days o ISS andOSS also showed consistency, withNew Hampshire schools averagingabout 14 days o ISS and 31 days oOSS or every 100 students. As thesetrends were very stable across years,all remaining analyses use the fiveyears o data (2010 through 2014)pooled together.

o exclusionary discipline,47 48 andschool administrators’ belies regard-ing exclusionary discipline have beenound to contribute substantially to

variation in its use as well.

49

A common argument in supporto exclusionary school disciplineis that it creates a better learningenvironment or other students.However, the research does notuphold this assertion.50 Zero toler-ance policies and subsequent highrates o exclusionary discipline havenot been ound to improve aca-demic perormance or the broaderstudent population. Some research

indicates the opposite—that evenstudents uninvolved in exclusionarydiscipline themselves suffer rom“collateral consequences” i theyattend schools at which it is re-quently administered.51 For example,these uninvolved students have beenshown to earn lower math and read-ing scores than uninvolved studentsin schools with lower or averagerates o exclusionary discipline.52

Findings: Use of Exclu-

sionary Discipline in New

Hampshire Schools from

2010 to 2014

According to national reports,the average U.S. rates o studentssuspended out o school at leastonce were 2.6 percent or elemen-tary schools and 10.1 percent or

secondary schools in 2011–12. Inthat same year, the rates in NewHampshire were 1.1 percent and9.0 percent or elementary andsecondary schools, respectively.53 New Hampshire’s rate o expulsionwas also ound to be lower than thenational average. In act, remarkablyso—at 0.01 percent or all studentsand 0.02 percent or middle and

Grade Enrollment

Number of Students Who Experienced Percent

experiencing

any

exclusionary

discipline

In-school

suspension

Out-of-

school

suspension

Expulsion

Any

exclusionary

discipline

1 13,470 63 109 0 151 1.1%

2 13,504 110 115 0 188 1.4%

3 13,545 128 148 0 238 1.8%

4 13,920 144 180 0 282 2.0%

5 13,921 347 349 0 531 3.8%

6 14,218 773 487 0 950 6.7%

7 14,331 1138 857 0 1451 10.1%

8 14,609 1448 1125 3 1877 12.8%

9 15,498 1117 1203 6 1853 12.0%

10 14,882 993 1178 3 1754 11.8%

11 13,962 901 998 3 1577 11.3%

12 14,293 876 1089 3 1634 11.4%

TABLE 1. STUDENTS EXPERIENCING EXCLUSIONARY DISCIPLINE IN NEW

HAMPSHIRE SCHOOLS, 2013 TO 2014 SCHOOL YEAR

Source: New Hampshire Department of Education



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Schools across New Hampshireturn to exclusionary discipline atconsiderably different rates, however,and in many schools, ISS and OSS are

rather rare. For instance, hal o thesecondary schools in the state issuean ISS to ewer than 3.9 percent otheir students, while roughly a quar-ter o schools issue no ISS. In con-trast, secondary schools in the highestquartile o the state or their use oISS issue it to more than 11.7 percento students. Te distribution o OSSrates is equally wide. Furthermore,students attending urban middleand high schools are roughly twice

as likely to experience ISS and threetimes as likely to experience OSScompared with students at non-urbanmiddle and high schools (able 2).According to separate and unre-lated data rom the New HampshireDepartment o Education, the mostrequently cited reason or OSS inurban middle and high schools in the2013–2014 school year was “vio-lent offenses against property” (58percent), while the more subjective“other” category accounted or themajority o ISS (73 percent).54

All o New Hampshire’surban schools are located inHillsborough County, the mostpopulous county in the state andhome to the Manchester–Nashuaurban corridor. Approximatelyhal o public school students inHillsborough County rom kin-dergarten through grade 12 attend

urban schools, translating to over27,000 students or 14.3 percent oall public school students state-wide. Urban middle and highschools are roughly twice as largeas non-urban middle and highschools in New Hampshire. heyare also considerably poorer andmore diverse, with average enroll-ments o 43.4 percent students

Percent

of NHSchools

Percent

of NHStudents

Average

PercentISS

Average

PercentOSS

Average

PercentExpelled

Average

Days of

ISS/100

Students

Average

Days of

OSS/100

Students

Urban 8.1% 15.4% 13.7% 20.2% 0.08% 73.8 161.0

Suburban 22.9% 35.4% 6.6% 6.2% 0.01% 16.9 37.0

Town 25.9% 20.5% 5.9% 6.4% 0.02% 15.9 34.6

Rural 43.1% 28.7% 7.2% 5.8% 0.02% 17.7 24.9

TABLE 2: EXCLUSIONARY DISCIPLINE IN NEW HAMPSHIRE MIDDLE AND

HIGH SCHOOLS ACROSS GEOGRAPHIC CATEGORIES, 2010 TO 2014.


eligible or ree or reduced-price

lunch and 29.1 percent studentso color, compared to 25.2 percentand 6.4 percent, respectively, inthe state’s non-urban schools.

Rates of High

Exclusionary Discipline

O interest here is not only whethersome schools are more requentlyusing exclusionary discipline, butalso whether some schools are

more requently using high levels oexclusionary discipline, defined hereas five or more days o OSS and/or expulsion.55 In New Hampshireschools, high exclusionary disciplinewas experienced by 3.5 percent o allstudents rom 2010 through 2014.It is important to re-emphasize thatthe loss o classroom time result-ing rom high levels o exclusionarydiscipline is associated with poor

academic outcomes

56 57

as well as agreater likelihood o involvement inthe juvenile justice system.58

Figure 1 presents the character-istics o schools that are, and arenot, in the highest quartile o highexclusionary discipline. Schoolswith the higher rates o high exclu-sionary discipline are larger, muchmore likely to be urban, and serve

more FRL eligible students and stu-

dents o color than do the schoolswith lower rates. Perhaps moreinterestingly, the schools with thehigher rates o high exclusionarydiscipline based on the use o OSSand expulsion also use ISS con-siderably more ofen, suggestingthat OSS and expulsions are usedin addition to—and not insteado—ISS.

O those students who wereadministered an ISS between the 2010

and 2014 school years, 43.9 percentexperienced a total o only one day osuspension in the respective year, andthree-quarters experienced a total othree days or ewer (not pictured).Tus, most students administeredan ISS experienced relatively ewtotal days o suspension. Conversely,nearly 42 percent o students whowere administered an OSS missed atotal o a week o school (five days) ormore, placing them in the categoryo high exclusionary discipline. Only18.9 percent o students administeredan ISS experienced as many total dayso this orm o suspension. However,the two groups are not unrelated—43.5 percent o students adminis-tered an ISS are administered bothISS and OSS rather than ISS aloneover the course o the year.



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Students at Higher Risk

Nationwide, schools are usingexclusionary discipline morerequently with male students,59 students o color,60 lower incomestudents,61 and students with dis-

abilities.62

New Hampshire, as seenin able 3, is no exception: malestudents, students o color, FRLeligible students, students withdisabilities, and homeless studentsin New Hampshire’s middle andhigh schools are all considerablymore likely to be administeredsome orm o suspension. Studentswith any o these characteristics

FIGURE 1: SELECTED CHARACTERISTICS OF SCHOOLS WITH HIGHER AND

LOWER RATES OF STUDENTS EXPERIENCING HIGH LEVELS OF EXCLUSIONARY

DISCIPLINE IN NEW HAMPSHIRE MIDDLE AND HIGH SCHOOLS, 2010 TO 2014


are also approximately two to ourtimes as likely to experience highexclusionary discipline.

In able 4, viewing the relation-ship between student characteristicsand the likelihood o experiencingexclusionary discipline in a different

way, we report on the characteristicsand circumstances that appear toput students at heightened risk oexperiencing high exclusionary dis-cipline.63 For instance, i a studentis at low risk—she is a white emalewithout a disability rom a higher-income amily home, attending anon-urban school—the estimatedlikelihood that she will experience

high exclusionary discipline is only0.8 percent. In contrast, approxi-mately one in three male students ocolor, with a disability, who are FRL

eligible and attend urban schoolswill experience high exclusionarydiscipline; this statistic jumps toone in two i that student is alsohomeless. Te estimated effect oattending an urban school on expe-riencing high exclusionary disci-pline is especially dramatic.

An important takeaway romable 4 is that although studentso color are administered exclu-sionary discipline at much higherrates than their white peers, weind this relationship to be largelyan artiact o other circumstancesthat students o color o mayexperience.64 Gender, FRL eligi-bility status, disability status, andhomelessness status o a studentall have a moderate eect on thelikelihood o high exclusionarydiscipline. Attending an urbanschool presents a major risk.65 It

is important to note that studentlevel actors included here ascontributing to the risk o highexclusionary discipline do notreer to risky or negative behaviorsin which students are engaging,but rather describe the studentcharacteristics and circumstancesassociated with higher likelihoodo experiencing exclusionarydiscipline. Furthermore, as high-lighted in the introduction, it is

not possible to determine rom theavailable data i there are dispari-ties in how exclusionary disciplineis applied to dierent students orthe same behaviors. Our indingsdemonstrate only that the studentswho share some o these charac-teristics and circumstances aresigniicantly more likely to experi-ence exclusionary discipline.



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TABLE 3. EXCLUSIONARY DISCIPLINE BY STUDENT CHARACTERISTICS IN

NEW HAMPSHIRE MIDDLE AND HIGH SCHOOLS, 2010 TO 2014

Characteristic PercentISS

PercentOSS

PercentHigh

Average

Days of

ISS

Average

Days of

OSS

GenderFemale 48.4% 4.5% 5.4% 2.1% 0.13 0.30

Male 51.6% 9.3% 11.1% 4.8% 0.32 0.74

Race

White 89.9% 6.6% 7.5% 3.0% 0.20 0.45

Students

of Color 10.1% 10.4% 15.6% 7.9% 0.45 1.25

FRL

Eligible

No 75.6% 4.8% 5.6% 2.1% 0.13 0.31

Yes 24.4% 13.7% 16.6% 7.8% 0.52 1.21

Disability

No 84.3% 5.8% 7.0% 2.8% 0.18 0.42

Yes 15.7% 13.3% 15.2% 7.2% 0.50 1.09


Discussion

School discipline has been in thenational spotlight recently as theU.S. Department o Education and

other government officials workedtogether to create a national conver-sation about decreasing the use oexclusionary discipline in schools.Tis national conversation includeda summit at the White House todiscuss strategies to “rethink schooldiscipline.”66 Exclusionary schooldiscipline practices, and in particularhigh levels o exclusionary discipline,are disproportionately affecting

already disadvantaged students onboth the national level and in theState o New Hampshire. In general,the students most severely impactedby the missed classroom time result-ing rom exclusionary discipline arethose who are already at high risk opoor academic outcomes acing chal-lenges such as poverty, homelessness,and disability status.

o reiterate, we were unable toexplain with the available data i

exclusionary discipline is beingused disproportionately withsome New Hampshire students versus others engaging in thesame prohibited behaviors. It isclear, however, regardless o thecause, that certain groups ostudents do experience dispro-portionate levels o exclusionarydiscipline. he ultimate successo students sharing the character-istics associated with an elevatedprobability o experiencing highlevels o exclusionary disciplinemay depend in part on howtheir schools respond to them.

TABLE 4: RISK OF EXPERIENCING HIGH EXCLUSIONARY DISCIPLINE BY STU-

DENT CHARACTERISTICS AND CIRCUMSTANCES, NEW HAMPSHIRE MIDDLE

AND HIGH SCHOOLS, 2010 TO 2014

Male?Student of

Color?

FRL

Eligible? Disability?

Attends

an UrbanSchool?

Homeless?

Percent

Likelihood of

Experiencing

High

Exclusionary

Discipline

No No No No No No 0.8%

Yes No No No No No 1.8%

Yes Yes No No No No 2.1%

Yes Yes Yes No No No 5.4%

Yes Yes Yes Yes No No 10.8%

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 34.9%

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes 51.7%




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hereore, it is worth exploringhow students at higher risk canbe diverted rom this trajectory.he stable patterns o exclusion-

ary discipline between the yearso 2010 and 2014 suggest thatcurrent trends at New Hampshire’sschools will continue into utureyears without such relection.Given the notably higher rates ouse o exclusionary discipline inour state’s urban school districts,or example, school policies andenvironments should be assessedor opportunities to reverse thesetrends and provide more students

with consistent classroom timeand instruction.

rather than excluding studentsor misbehavior. A longitudinalstudy o Denver public schoolssaw an almost 5 percent decrease

over a our year period in the useo exclusionary discipline aterimplementing a restorative justiceramework.70 School wide posi-tive behavior interventions, whichinclude positive rewards orappropriate behavior, also demon-strate a reduction in exclusionarypractices, though not as pro-nounced a dierence as restor-ative justice.71

Te findings presented in this

brie raise many questions regard-ing why certain groups receiveexclusionary discipline more thanothers. For example, why are boystwice as likely to experience thesepractices compared to girls? Whyis poverty a significant predictoro exclusionary discipline? Whyare rates o exclusionary disci-pline remarkably higher at urbanschools? And what do these find-ings suggest about how studentsexperience public education in NewHampshire, particularly studentswith multiple risk actors or exclu-sionary discipline and its associatedoutcomes? Te answers to thesequestions are not simple, and willlikely require more research.

E n d n o t e s1. Daniel J. Losen and Jonathan Gillespie,“Opportunities Suspended: Te DisparateImpact o Disciplinary Exclusion romSchool” (Los Angeles, CA: Te Center or

Civil Rights Remedies at the Civil RightsProject, University o Caliornia, LosAngeles, 2012).

2. U.S. Department o EducationOffice or Civil Rights, “Civil RightsData Collection Data Snapshot:School Discipline,” Issue Brie No.1 (Washington, DC: United StatesDepartment o Education, Office orCivil Rights, 2014), 1–24

3. Daniel Losen et al., “Are We Closingthe Discipline Gap,” Te Center for Civil

Rights Remedies, (2015): 1–50.

4. National Association or theEducation o Homeless Youth andChildren, “2010 Report on Indiana’sHomeless Children and Youth”(Minneapolis, MN: National Associationor the Education o Homeless Youthand Children, 2012), available at http://naehcy.org/sites/deault/files/dl/con-2012/endres-2010-rpt.pd.

5. Matthew . Teriot, Sarah W. Craun,and David R. Dupper, “Multilevel

Evaluation o Factors Predicting SchoolExclusion among Middle and HighSchool Students,” Children & YouthServices Review, vol. 32, no. 1 (2010):13–19.

6. Amanda L. Sullivan, Ethan R. VanNorman, and David A. Klingbeil,“Exclusionary Discipline o Studentswith Disabilities: Student and SchoolCharacteristics Predicting Suspension,”Remedial & Special Education, vol. 35,no. 4 (2014): 199–210.

7. U.S. Department o Education, “CivilRights Data Collection Snapshot,” 2014.

8. Amity Noltemeyer and Caven S.Mcloughlin, “Patterns o ExclusionaryDiscipline by School ypology,Ethnicity, and Teir Interaction,”Perspectives on Urban Education, vol.7,no.1 (2010): 27–40.

Given the notably higher rateso use o exclusionary disciplinein our state’s urban school dis-tricts, school policies and envi-ronments should be assessedor opportunities to reversethese trends and provide morestudents with consistent class-room time and instruction.

Ideally, alternative disciplin-ary techniques would help os-ter school bonding and schoolengagement, rather than severthe already tenuous connec-tions at-risk students may havewith teachers and administra-

tors.67 Alternatives to tradi-tional disciplinary strategiessuch as restorative justice68 andpositive behavior interventions69 have been shown to reduce theuse o exclusionary discipline.Restorative justice emphasizeshealing and enhancing the schoolcommunity through inclusion,

8 C A R S E Y SC H O O L O F P U B L I C P O L I C Y


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9. Barbara Wauchope, “StudentDiscipline in New Hampshire Schools,”(Durham, NH: Carsey Institute, Fall2009).

10. Full day suspension data, bothin-school and out-o-school, is sel-reported and not verified otherthan comparing to prior years orreasonableness.

11. New Hampshire Department oEducation, Part Ed. 317, 2012.

12. U.S. Department o Agriculture,Child Nutrition Programs; IncomeEligibility Guidelines Correction (FederalRegister Vol. 78, No. 61, 2013), availableat http://www.ns.usda.gov/sites/deault/files/IEG_able-032913.pd.

13. New Hampshire Department oEducation, Planning Guide or LocalEducation Agency (LEA) Servicesto Children and Youth in HomelessSituations (Concord, NH: NewHampshire Department o Education,Division o Education Improvement,2012), available at http://education.nh.gov/instruction/integrated/planning_or_lea.htm.

14. New Hampshire Department oEducation, Administrative Rules or

Education and able o Contents: PartEd 317 (Concord, NH: New HampshireDepartment o Education, 2012),available at http://education.nh.gov/legislation/ed317.htm#Ed31702.

15. I racial identification is notprovided by the student or his/herparent or guardian, it is based insteadon school personnel observation.

16. Students covered only by Section504 without IEPs are not identifiedas students with disabilities in this

analysis.

17. U.S. Department o Education,Institute o Education Sciences,National Center or EducationStatistics: Common Core o Data,available at https://nces.ed.gov/ccd/rural_locales.asp.

18. Russell J. Skiba and KimberlyKnesting, “Zero olerance, ZeroEvidence: An Analysis o SchoolDisciplinary Practice,” New Directions

for Youth Development, no. 92 (2001):

17–43.

19. Losen et al., “Are We Closing theDiscipline Gap,” 2015.

20. Stephan Hoffman, “Zero Benefits:Estimating the Effect o Zero oleranceDiscipline Policies on Racial Disparitiesin School Discipline,” EducationalPolicy , vol. 28, no. 1 (2014): 69–95.


22. Hoffman, 2014.

23.Russell J. Skiba et al., “ParsingDisciplinary Disproportionality:Contributions o Inraction, Student,and School Characteristics to Out-o-School Suspension and Expulsion,”

American Educational Research Journal , vol. 51, no. 4 (2014): 640–670.

24. Russell J. Skiba, Mariella I.Arredondo, and Natasha . Williams,“More Tan a Metaphor: TeContribution o Exclusionary Disciplineto a School-to-Prison Pipeline,” Equity

and Excellence in Education, vol. 47, no.4 (2014): 546–564.

25. Emily Arcia, “Achievement andEnrollment Status o SuspendedStudents: Outcomes in a Large,Multicultural School District,”Education and Urban Society, vol. 38,no. 3 (2006): 359–369.

26. Ibid.

27. Balanz, Byrnes, and Fox, 2015.

28. Arcia, 2006.

29. U.S. Department o Education, “CivilRights Data Collection Snapshot,” 2014.

30. Anne Gregory, Russell J. Skiba, andPedro A. Noguera, “Te AchievementGap and the Discipline Gap: woSides o the Same Coin?” EducationalResearcher, vol. 39, no. 1 (2010): 59–68.

31. Allan Porowski, RosemarieO’Conner, and Aikaterini Passa,“Disproportionality in SchoolDiscipline: An Assessment o rends inMaryland, 2009–12” (Washington, DC,

Department o Education, Institute oEducation Sciences, National Centeror Education Evaluation and RegionalAssistance, Regional EducationalLaboratory Mid-Atlantic, 2014).

32. Joanna aylor, Matt Cregor, andPriya Lane, “Not Measuring Up:Te State o School Discipline inMassachusetts” (Boston, MA: Lawyers’Committee or Civil Rights andEconomic Justice, 2014).

33. Hoffman, 2014.

34. aylor, Cregor, and Lane, 2014.

35. ony Fabelo et al., “BreakingSchools’ Rules: A Statewide Studyo How School Discipline Relates toStudents’ Success and Juvenile JusticeInvolvement” (New York, NY: Councilo State Governments Justice Center,Public Policy Research Institute at exasA&M University, 2011).

36. aylor, Cregor, and Lane, 2014.

37. Amity Noltemeyer and Caven S.

McLoughlin, “Patterns o ExclusionaryDiscipline by School ypology,Ethnicity, and their Interaction,”Perspectives on Urban Education, vol. 7,no. 1 (2010): 27–40.

38. Christine A. Christie, C. MichaelNelson, and Kristine Jolivette, “SchoolCharacteristics Related to the Use oSuspension,” Education and reatmentof Children, vol. 27, no. 4 (2004):509–526.

39. Gregory, Skiba, and Noguera, 2010.

40. Daniel Losen et al. “Are We Closingthe Discipline Gap,” Te Center for CivilRights Remedies, (2015): 1–50.

41. Amanda L. Sullivan, Ethan R. VanNorman, and David A. Klingbeil,“Exclusionary Discipline o Studentswith Disabilities: Student and SchoolCharacteristics Predicting Suspension,”Remedial & Special Education 35, no. 4(2014): 199–210.



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42. McCathy G.McElderry andyrone C. Cheng, “Understanding theDiscipline Gap rom an EcologicalPerspective,” Children and Schools, vol.36, no. 4 (2014): 241–249.

43. Christine A. Christie, C. MichaelNelson, and Kristine Jolivette, “SchoolCharacteristics Related to the Use oSuspension,” Education and reatment ofChildren, vol. 27, no. 4 (2004): 509–526.

44. Caven S. Mcloughlin and AmityL. Noltemeyer, “Research into FactorsContributing to Discipline Use andDisproportionality in Major UrbanSchools,” Current Issues in Education,

vol. 13, no. 2 (2010): 1–21.

45. Scott E. Carrell and Susan A.Carrell, “Do Lower Student toCounselor Rations Reduce SchoolDisciplinary Problems,” Contributionsto Economic Analysis and Policy, vol. 5,no. 1 (2006): 1–24.

46. Norris M. Haynes, Christine Emmons,and Michael Ben-Avie, “School Climateas a Factor in Student Adjustment andAchievement,” Journal of Educational andPsychological Consultation, vol. 8, no. 3(1997): 321–329.

47. Christie, Nelson, and Jolivette, 2004.

48. Russell J. Skiba et al., “ParsingDisciplinary Disproportionality:Contributions o Inraction, Student,and School Characteristics to Out-o-School Suspension and Expulsion,”

American Educational Research Journal , vol. 51, no. 4 (2014): 640–670.

49. Skiba et al.,” 2014.

50. Daniel J. Losen and ia ElenaMartinez, “Out o School and Offrack: Te Overuse o Suspensions in

American Middle and High Schools”(Los Angeles, CA: Te UCLA Centeror Civil Rights Remedies, Te CivilRights Project, 2013).

51. Brea L. Perry and Edward W.Morris, “Suspending Progress:Collateral Consequences oExclusionary Punishment in PublicSchools,” American Sociological Review,

vol. 79, no. 6 (2014): 1067–1087.

52. Brea L. Perry and Edward W.Morris, “Suspending Progress:Collateral Consequences oExclusionary Punishment in PublicSchools,” American Sociological Review,

vol. 79, no. 6 (2014): 1067–1087.


54. New Hampshire Department oEducation, “NH School and DistrictProfiles,” School Saety Survey 2013–14.Available at the school level only athttps://my.doe.nh.gov/profiles/.

55. As expulsion is very rare (see able1), this group consists primarily ostudents experiencing five or more totaldays o OSS in a given year.

56. Robert Balanz, Vaughan Byrnes,and Joanna Hornig Fox, “Sent Homeand Put Off rack: Te Antecedents,Disproportionalities, and Consequenceso Being Suspended in the 9th Grade,”Closing the School Discipline Gap:Equitable Remedies for ExcessiveExclusion, edited by Daniel J. Losen(New York: eacher’s College Press,2015), 17–30.

57. Regarding ISS, there is no universalprotocol addressing how that time is used,

and it is thereore not clear what typeo supervision or instruction, i any, isprovided during the suspension period.

58. Skiba et al.,”Parsing DisciplinaryDisproportionality,” 2014.

59. U.S. Department o Education,“Civil Rights Data Collection Snapshot,”2014.

60. Losen et al., “Are We Closing theDiscipline Gap,” 2015

61. Teriot, Craun, and Dupper, 2010.


63. A logistic model with school-level cluster robust standard errorswas generated by regressing “highexclusionary discipline” on all variablesincluded in table 3. Charter school andhigher-poverty school binary variableswere also tested, but due to a lack o

statistical significance, were droppedrom the final model.

64. In other words, controlling orother covariates in the aorementionedregression analysis, we find that race isnot a meaningul predictor o whetheror not a student experiences highexclusionary discipline.

65. Te magnitude o risk actors isroughly gauged by the percent changein likelihood when the actor is added.For example, the percent likelihoodo experiencing high exclusionarydiscipline doubles rom 1.3 percentto 2.6 percent when “male” is added,but it only increases about .3 percent(rom 2.6 percent to 2.9 percent) when

“student o color” is added.

66. See http://www.ed.gov/news/press-releases/educators-gather-white-house-rethink-school-discipline.

67. Skiba, Arredondo, and Williams,“More Tan a Metaphor,” 2014.

68. Tomas Gonzalez, “SocializingSchools: Addressing Racial Disparitiesin Discipline Trough RestorativeJustice,” Closing the School DisciplineGap: Equitable Remedies for ExcessiveExclusion, edited by Daniel J. Losen

(New York: eacher’s College Press,2015), 151–165.

69. Claudia G. Vincent et al.,“Effectiveness o Schoolwide PositiveBehavior Interventions and Supportsin Reducing Racially InequitableDisciplinary Exclusion,” Closing theSchool Discipline Gap: EquitableRemedies for Excessive Exclusion, editedby Daniel J. Losen (New York: eacher’sCollege Press, 2015), 207–221.

70. Gonzalez, 2015.

71. Vincent et al, 2015.



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A b o u t t h e A u t h o r s

Douglas Gagnon is a vulnerableamilies research associateat the Carsey School o Public

Policy and a PhD recipientin education at the University oNew Hampshire ([email protected]).

Eleanor M. Jaffee, PhD, is a researchassistant proessor and seniorevaluation research associate at theCarsey School o Public Policy, anda research affiliate in the social workdepartment, at the University o NewHampshire ([email protected]).

Reeve Kennedy is a graduate stu-dent in the sociology department atthe University o New Hampshireand a research assistant at theCarsey School o Public Policy([email protected]).

A c k n o w l e d g e m e n t s

Tis study was commissioned byNew Hampshire Kids Count. Wethank their staff and partners or

providing guidance or its concep-tualization, resources or gather-ing secondary data, and helpulcomments and suggestions onthe draf o this brie. We alsothank our Carsey School o PublicPolicy colleagues: Deputy DirectorCurt Grimm, CommunicationsCoordinator Laurel Lloyd, DigitalMedia Coordinator Bianca Nicolosi,and Research Assistant EmilyBerube. Support or this project

was provided by the Annie E. CaseyFoundation, M&R Strategic Services,and Endowment or Health.



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he Carsey School o Public Policy at the University o NewHampshire is nationally recognized or its research, policy

education, and engagement. he school takes on thepressing issues o the twenty-irst century, striving or

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