Each year, millions of students are removed from their classrooms for minor misconduct. This puts them at a significantly higher risk of falling behind academically, dropping out of school, and potentially being forced into the juvenile justice system.

Of these students who face school discipline, a disproportionately large percentage are youth of color, students with disabilities, and students who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender.

At the Federation, we are committed to building safe and welcoming schools where students are free from harsh discipline policies. And we know our members are, too.

A new report from the Council of State Governments Justice Center (CSG Justice Center) can help you to better understand the most effective approaches to school discipline in order to influence schools to adopt better policies. The School Discipline Consensus Report provides school leaders, state and local government officials, and advocates with more than 60 recommendations for overhauling ineffective approaches to school discipline.

Download The School Discipline Consensus Report here.

CSG Justice Center has worked with more than 100 key experts, including members from the Dignity in Schools Campaign, over the past three years to identify evidence-based recommendations to reform discipline in public schools. The report includes strategies that are practical, innovative, and based on successful efforts that have been made in schools across the country.

According to the report, improving school discipline policy requires addressing the disparate impact that the current approach has on particular student populations:

• Black, Hispanic, and American Indian students are suspended at much higher rates than their white peers—sometimes at double the rate.
• Twenty percent of secondary school students with disabilities were suspended in a single school year, compared to fewer than ten percent of their peers without disabilities.
• LGBT youth are up to three times more likely to experience harsh disciplinary treatment than their non-LGBT counterparts.

The School Discipline Consensus Report offers recommendations to help decrease the disparities present in school discipline policies. And it establishes what it will take to reduce the number of youth suspended from school while providing learning conditions that help all students succeed.

This report teaches us that the only way to achieve our goal is to work with one another — to create a combination of a positive school climate, tiered levels of behavioral interventions, and a partnership between education, police, and court officials that is dedicated to preventing youth arrests or referrals to the juvenile justice system for minor school-based offenses.

Suspensions, expulsions and police interventions in schools harm students’ chances of success. It is our job as leaders to promote a more supportive school environment.

Download The School Discipline Consensus Report here.