The debate over students with learning disabilities, suspensions and race
New research finds that learning disabilities might have nothing to do with why black students are suspended more than whites students
A look at raw numbers of who is most likely to be suspended from school indicates that black students and students with learning disabilities are at the top of the list. For example, 23 percent of black students and 18 percent of students with disabilities were suspended from high school during 2011-12 school year, compared with fewer than 7 percent of white students overall.
Combine the categories of black and disability with gender and the statistics are even more troubling. Almost 34 percent, or more than a third of black boys with a learning disability were suspended in high school, double the rate of white boys with a learning disability. On the face of it, black students with learning disabilities are the most targeted group for suspensions and account for a big chunk of the school-to-prison pipeline. (That’s a term researchers use to describe how kids who are frequently suspended become prime candidates for dropping out of school entirely. Uneducated, without employment prospects, they’re more likely to become criminals and end up in prison.)
Indeed, the Obama administration was so worried that black kids with learning disabilities were getting suspended from school too often that it used the nation’s laws that govern educating students with disabilities to create a new rule for states to monitor discipline rates among racial and ethnic groups. The new rule also called for a reallocation of funds in school districts that were found to have CONTINUE READING: The debate over students with learning disabilities, suspensions and race - The Hechinger Report
