Decreasing Disproportionate School Discipline Actions with Black, Male, and Special Education Students: A Roadmap to Success (Part II)

Taking a Hard Look at Our Practices, Our Interactions, and Ourselves

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Dear Colleagues,

Introduction:  Back to the Future

   Almost immediately after writing Part I of this Blog series a few weeks ago, two additional reports (see below) were published providing additional, persistent documentation regarding how African-American students and Students with Disabilities (SWD) continue to be discriminated against in our schools relative to discipline, office discipline referrals, and school suspensions.

   This Blog Part II does the following:

   * Summarizes the critical points from Part I of this series; and

   * Describes the information provided in the two new recent reports on disproportionality with minority students and SWDs.  These reports are:

     U.S. Office of Civil Rights’ School Climate and Safety brief based on its 2015-16 Civil Rights Data Collection data base

     Disabling Punishment: The Need for Remedies to the Disparate Loss of Instruction Experienced by Black Students with Disabilities from the Center for Civil Rights Remedies at the UCLA Civil Rights Project, and the Houston Institute for Race and Justice

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   Taking the two reports above together, they provide data from schools across the country demonstrating that, once again, African-American and SWDs are disproportionately missing school—and needed academic instruction—when compared with students from other racial and cultural backgrounds.  Moreover, African-American SWDs are additionally missing disproportionately more time than their white SWD peers.

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Why Disproportionality Outcomes Haven’t Changed

   In Blog Part I, we reviewed six primary flaws that explain why most of the disproportionality “efforts” to date have not worked:

Flaw #1.  Legislatures (and other “leaders”) are trying to change practices through policies.

Flaw #2.  State Departments of Education (and other “leaders”) are promoting one-size-fits-all programs with “scientific” foundations that do not exist or are flawed.

Flaw #3.  Districts and schools are implementing disproportionality “solutions” (Frameworks) that target conceptual constructs rather than teaching social, emotional, and behavioral skills. 

Flaw #4. Districts and Schools are not recognizing that Classroom Management and Teacher Training, Supervision, and Evaluation are Keys to Decreasing Disproportionality.

Flaw #5.  Schools and Staff are trying to motivate students to change their behavior when they have not learned, mastered, or cannot apply the social, emotional, and behavioral skills needed to succeed.

Flaw #6.  Districts, Schools, and Staff do not have the knowledge, skills, and resources needed to implement the multi-tiered (prevention, strategic intervention, intensive need/crisis management) social, emotional, and/or behavioral services, supports, and interventions needed by students.

[CLICK HERE for Blog Part I]

   By understanding these flaws, districts and schools can evaluate their current effective school and schooling, and school discipline and classroom management practices—applying them to students from minority backgrounds and students with disabilities.

   The ultimate point here is this:

During the past ten-plus years of trying to systemically decrease disproportionality in schools, we have not comprehensively and objectively identified the root causes of the students’ challenging behaviors, and we have not linked these root causes to strategically-applied multi-tiered science-to-practice strategies and interventions that are effectively and equitably used by teachers and administrators.  

Moreover, we have not comprehensively and objectively identified and addressed the root causes of staff members’ interactions and reactions with African-American students, boys, and students with disabilities. . . reactions that, at times, are the reasons for some disproportionate Office Discipline Referrals (when compared with the other groups in the Figures above).

And, we have not comprehensively and objectively identified and addressed the root causes of administrators’ disproportionate decisions with these students as they relate to suspensions, expulsions, law enforcement involvement, and referrals to alternative school programs.

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Solving the Disproportionality Dilemma

   In this Blog message, we discuss the following:

   In order to establish effective, multi-tiered systems that address disproportionality, we need to strategically implement effective school discipline, classroom management, and student self-management systems, strategies, and (as needed) strategic and intensive interventions.

   The ultimate goal here, for students from minority backgrounds and SWDs (although the goal is the same for all students), is for these students to learn, master, and be able to apply—from preschool through high school—social, emotional, and behavioral self-management skills.

   In order to attain the goal of helping these (and all) students develop effective interpersonal, social problem-solving, conflict prevention and resolution, and emotional control and coping skills, five interdependent science-to-practice components are needed.  Moreover, as some students need more strategic and/or intensive services, supports, strategies, or interventions to attain the “ultimate goal,” these components must be available along a multi-tiered continuum.

   The five interdependent components (see the Figure below) needed to help minority and SWDs to realize social, emotional, and behavioral self-management are:

   * Positive Relationships and School/Classroom Climate
   * Positive Behavioral Expectations and Skills Instruction
   * Student Motivation and Accountability
   * Consistency
   * Implementation and Application Across All Settings and All Peer Groups

   The remainder of the Blog describes these components in detail as related to minority students, SWDs, and the goal of decreasing or eliminating disproportionate office referrals and school suspensions.

   Significantly, the discussion includes the development and implementation of a classroom motivation and accountability system that is anchored by a Behavioral Matrix.

   Every Behavioral Matrix has components that address appropriate versus inappropriate behavior, respectively.  The first two parts of the Matrix specify (a) the behavioral expectations in the classroom connected (b) with positive responses, motivating incentives, and periodic rewards.

   The third and fourth parts identify four progressive “Intensity Levels” of inappropriate behavior, connected with corresponding corrective responses, in and out-of-classroom consequences, and administrative actions.  These components make students aware of how inappropriate behavior will be addressed when it occurs—thereby (a) motivating student to avoid these responses by demonstrating appropriate behavior, or (b) preparing students for the consequences or administrative responses if they choose to demonstrate inappropriate behavior.

  Critically, when students and staff are taught and begin to internalize the Behavioral Matrix and its processes, student motivation and self-management increases, as does effective classroom management and teacher consistency.

   Relative to disproportionality, when teachers consistently use the Intensity I, II, and III areas of the Matrix for all students, disproportionality is decreased or eliminated.  Often, this occurs because the Matrix specifically discriminates between annoying (Intensity I) and disruptive behavior in the classroom (Intensity II)—explicitly the identifying different responses that are differentially appropriate for them.

   When Administrators additionally hold teachers accountable for using the Matrix appropriately and consistently for all students, once again, disproportionality is effectively addressed. 

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Summary

   While they are important in reminding us that we have not successfully addressed disproportionality in our schools nationwide, and while they hold us continually accountable, we do not need to spend most of our time more reading reports documenting this problem. 

   Instead, we need to do something functionally, systemically, and substantively about the problem.

   This Blog reviews the science-to-practice components that have successfully addressed disproportionality in the thousands of schools we have worked in across the country.

   With our partner schools, staff, and students, we have been successful because we have analyzed and addressed the underlying student- and staff-focused reasons for the problem—while implementing multi-tiered disciplinary and student service approaches along a prevention, strategic intervention, and intensive need continuum.

   Please read the entire Blog.  What do you think?

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