![]() ![]() Only 5% of all out-of-school suspensions were for weapons or drugs, said the NEPC report, citing a 2006 study. There’s been a kind of “zero-tolerance creep” since schools adopted “zero-tolerance” policies. If you think all these suspensions are for weapons and drugs, recalibrate. For Native Americans, it’s almost tripled, from 3% to 8%. It’s more than doubled for Hispanics to 7%, and to a stunning 15% for blacks. Since the 1970s, says a National Education Policy Center report published in October 2011, the suspension rate’s nearly doubled for white kids, to 6%. schools suspend millions of kids - 3,328,750, to be exact. ![]() Take a short walk on the dark side of our public education system, and you learn some disturbing lessons about school punishment.įirst. It made a believer out of me right away.” “Just by asking kids what’s going on with them, they just started talking. “It sounds simple,” says Sporleder about the new approach. 135 suspensions (days students were out of school).798 suspensions (days students were out of school).He went to ISS - in-school suspension, a quiet, comforting room where he can talk about anything with the attending teacher, catch up on his homework, or just sit and think about how maybe he could do things differently next time.īefore the words “namby-pamby”, “weenie”, or “not the way they did things in my day” start flowing across your lips, take a look at these numbers: 2009-2010 (Before new approach) “The kid still got a consequence,” explains Sporleder – but he wasn’t sent home, a place where there wasn’t anyone who cares much about what he does or doesn’t do. He’s promised me things my whole life and never keeps those promises.” The waterfall of words that go deep into his home life, which is no piece of breeze, end with this sentence: “I shouldn’t have blown up at the teacher.”Īnd then he goes back to the teacher and apologizes. The armor-plated defenses melt like ice under a blowtorch and the words pour out: “My dad’s an alcoholic. Ready, man! For an anger blast to his face….”How could you do that?” “What’s wrong with you?”…and for the big boot out of school. On a scale of 1-10, where are you with your anger?” What’s going on?” He gets even more specific: “You really looked stressed. Instead, Sporleder sits the kid down and says quietly: “Wow. The usual approach at Lincoln – and, safe to say, at most high schools in this country – is automatic suspension. This is how it went down: A student blows up at a teacher, drops the F-bomb. In fact, it worked so well that he never went back to the Old Approach to Student Discipline. THE FIRST TIME THAT principal Jim Sporleder tried the New Approach to Student Discipline at Lincoln High School in Walla Walla, WA, he was blown away. Jim Sporleder, principal of Lincoln High School
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |