Reply to Violence in Kindergarten- Sligo Creek Elementary

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote]Teachers’ responses to students have resulted in racial disparities, with ethnic and racial minority students receiving behavioral sanctions at higher rates (Skiba, Michael, Nardo & Peterson, 2002). [b]Racial disparities persist even after controlling for socioeconomic class, neighborhood features, and severity of the offense [/b](Wallace, Goodkind, Wallace, & Bachman, 2008). [b]Racial disparities are most pronounced in referrals requiring subjective interpretation of student behavior, such as deviance and disrespect[/b], but [b]disparities disappear for the more serious behavioral disruptions that are detected more objectively, such as smoking or physical altercations[/b] (APA Zero Tolerance Task Force, 2008; Gregory & Weinstein, 2008; KewelRamani, Gilbertson, Fox & Provasnki, 2007, Skiba et al., 2002). Racial disparities persist when teachers are able to exercise their discretion in making referrals and when school policies (e.g., Zero Tolerance) require teachers to refer automatically for specific behavioral disruptions (see APA Task Force, 2008). Disciplinary referrals have been shown to be devastating to the educational achievement of targeted students (APA Zero Tolerance Task Force, 2008). Consequently, [b]racial disparities in disciplinary practices play a critical role in the racial disparities in educational achievement, particularly for African American students[/b] (Gregory & Weinstein, 2008).

Recent research demonstrates that individual variation is critical to understanding and reducing the disciplinary gap. Teachers frustrated by a student for whom they make repeated referrals perceive a problem student. [b]What these teachers may not realize is that most of these students (e.g., 86% in Gregory & Weinstein, 2008) are not referred in all of their classrooms, suggesting that many of these referrals are specific to particular teachers’ interactions[/b]. Gregory and Weinstein found more between classroom variability than within student variability, suggesting that student discipline reflects student-classroom interactions. Situations that teachers attribute problem students should be viewed as problems in the student-teacher relationship (Luiselli, Putnam, Handler & Feinberg, 2005; Pane, 2010).[b] Students are more defiant and act out more often in classrooms in which the teachers are perceived by the target student (and other students) as being uncaring and having low achievement expectations, but these same students cooperate with other teachers whom they perceived as caring and as having high expectations (Gregory & Weinstein, 2008). 
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Consequently, one explanation for the racial disparities in discipline appears to be differential selection (Piquero, 2008; Gregory et al., 2010) in which ethnic and racial minority youth are more likely to be selected as violating school or community policies even when rates and severity of rule violations are not different than those of Whites. In support of the differential selection hypothesis is that racial disparities in behavioral referrals, school suspensions and expulsions reflect teachers differentially selecting to punish ethnic and racial minority youth for infractions associated with more subjective criteria, such as defiance to challenges to teachers’ authority, rather than behavior that is more objectively evaluated, such as physical fights and possession of weapon (Gregory & Weinstein, 2008; Skiba et al, 2008; Vavrus & Cole, 2002). Gregory et al. attributed teachers’ discriminatory use of discipline practices to racial bias, cultural mismatch, and stereotypes of academic behavior of minority youth. The cultural mismatch hypothesis suggests a mismatch between student and teacher cultural expectations for behavior in which behavior that may be considered normative by students is interpreted as hostile, threatening, and defiant by teachers. This differential selection of ethnic and racial minority boys, along with disparities in reading, set the stage for higher rates of educational underachievement for boys of color.[/quote]

https://www.apa.org/ed/resources/racial-disparities.pdf[/quote]

Thank you. So this confirms what I theorized to be true:

For serious-level incident student discipline, racial discrimination is not a meaningful factor. For lower-level, it is. This is what I said and what evidence backs up. So why don't we talk about the issue in this manner instead of talking ALL student behavior/discipline issues as if they are the same? They aren't.[/quote]

Has anybody on this thread said that we shouldn't discipline serious offenses or any offenses? I feel like you're arguing with someone who isn't here.[/quote]

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