Earlier this year, a 15-year-old girl in Michigan was sent to a juvenile detention center for violating her probation. How did she violate it? By not completing her online coursework when her school switched to remote learning. The girl, identified as Grace, is a Black student with a learning disability–specifically, ADHD coupled with a mood disorder which caused her to get distracted easily and abandon her work. The school knew this, as her Individualized Education Plan (IEP) listed the school supports she needed to receive, none of which was being provided after the school switched to remote learning. Yet, Grace was the one being punished.
Here is another example: in August, a Colorado school called the police on a 12-year-old Black student with ADHD for playing with a Nerf gun during his virtual art class. At the time of the “incident,” the art teacher notified the vice principal and then emailed the student’s mother, explaining that her son, Isaiah, was distracted during class and playing with a gun that she believed to be fake. Before the mother could respond, the vice principal had already sent officers to Isaiah’s home. What was the result? Isaiah was suspended for five days, resulting in a record with the county sheriff’s office and a mark on his school disciplinary paperwork saying he brought a “facsimile of a firearm to school.” The school’s reasoning for their actions was safety, but since Isaiah was at home and not in a physical school building, if his safety was a concern, his parents should have been notified first before the police were called.
Unfortunately, there have been many other incidences similar to Grace and Isaiah. Exclusionary discipline policies have become the fallback mechanism for enforcement in the wake of online learning, and students of color with disabilities, particularly Black
students, have come to bear the burden. It is still unclear what virtual suspensions look like, but districts are coming up with their own interpretations. For example, Georgia Clayton County Public School District, has decided to discipline students via in-school and out-of-school virtual suspensions. In the former, students work in a virtual classroom with other students who have also been “suspended” and in the latter, students have to do assignments alone. Many other districts have followed similar protocol.
But the question is not how to implement student discipline policies effectively through online learning, it is why are we implementing them in the first place? In the midst of a global pandemic, where students and families are just trying to get by, the last thing schools should be doing is using exclusionary discipline practices to address “behavioral issues” that can and should be addressed in a different manner.
A Crisis Even Before COVID-19
The National Center on Safe Supportive Learning Environments defines school safety as promoting the protection of students from violence, bullying, harassment, and substance use. However, despite the emphasis on safety, districts’ implementation of exclusionary discipline policies as a means to “protect students” negatively affects students’ behavioral health and academic success as well as increases their involvement with the criminal justice system.
The Civil Rights Data Collection compiled data on the school climate and safety in United States public schools from 2015-2016, which showed that students with disabilities and Black students represented a disproportionately large number of students subjected to disciplinary action. Black students made up 15% of the population but represented 31% of students who were referred to law enforcement, 39% of students with an out-of-school suspension, and 33% of expelled students. Further, students with disabilities made up 12% of the overall population but represented 28% of students who were referred to law enforcement, 72% of students who were restrained, 26% of students who received an out-of-school suspension, and 24% of expelled students.
In the cases of Grace and Isaiah, it was the intersection of their identities that made them the most vulnerable – both were Black students with learning disabilities. This data shows that the concept of school safety and student discipline is bound to systemic racial bias and its effects have been further exacerbated during remote learning.
What’s Next? Shifting Our View of School Safety
Rather than prioritizing discipline as a means to curb behavioral problems, school safety should be reframed to prioritize students’ well-being. Not only does this ensure a climate that is conducive to learning, it also promotes a student-centered environment. Research shows that restorative practices such as community building in the classroom to improve relationships between students and staff are a much more effective way to address “school safety.”
What would a focus on students look like in a pandemic? First, start by identifying the needs of your students. For example, ensure that students, parents, and guardians have access to the technology and services they need, which we’ve seen most districts start to do. However, that alone is not enough. As we saw with Grace’s scenario earlier, a lot of IEP plans are not being adequately carried out with the transition to remote learning, and as a result, “behavioral changes” are being unnecessarily punished by way of disciplinary policies. So, it is also important to develop effective alternatives to services that were provided and currently cannot be provided in the short-term.
In a recent paper, Wendy Tucker, from the National Center for Special Education and Meghan Whittaker, from the National Center for Learning Disabilities, suggested that schools employ three proactive strategies to ensure that students with disabilities are able to thrive in a remote learning environment: robust communication, collaborative planning, and a commitment to a holistic approach to behavior.
Moreover, schools should abstain from relying on virtual suspensions as they just exacerbate the intense trauma families have been subjected to during this unprecedented time. Schooling has changed tremendously, and students are returning to the online classroom with even more stressors pertaining to illness, food and housing insecurity, and overall home-life instability. Educators, now more than ever, should be approaching student learning in a trauma-informed manner, connecting with students and their experiences in order to identify what support they need from schools. Our vulnerable students are continuing to fall through the cracks because districts are failing to facilitate an environment that best serves their needs.
Mikaila John is a law student at Loyola University Chicago School of Law and wrote this blog post as part of the Education Law Practicum.
