Sociocultural Correlates of Disciplinary Exclusion Among Students With Emotional, Behavioral, and Learning Disabilities in the SEELS National Dataset

Abstract

Suspension and expulsion are widely used to exclude students with and without disabilities who present problem behaviors in school, despite contentious legal debate and evidence associating these methods with high ecological stress and problematic developmental outcomes. Using selected participant data ( N = 1,824) from the SEELS study, the study authors entered multilevel predictors into logistic regression analyses to identify factors associated with higher likelihood of exclusion (HLE) among students in three high-exclusion disabilitygroups:emotional/behavioral disorders (EBD), other health impairment (OHI) with a diagnosis of attention-deficit/ hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and learning disability (LD). When the authors examined disability groups together, HLE was more likely among students with EBD and ADHD compared to students with LD. HLE was also associated with African American ethnicity, older age, male gender, low socio-economic status, multiple school changes, urban schooling, and having parents who expressed low school satisfaction. However, when the authors examined the disability groups individually, predictor profiles varied markedly by disability type.The authors discuss implications for school programs.

Disparities in School Discipline Practices for Students with Emotional and Learning Disabilities and Autism

“…In an attempt to make schools safer, school personnel began implementing zero-tolerance policies: "highly structured disciplinary polic [ies] that permit little flexibility in outcome by imposing severe sanctions (often long-term or expulsion) for even minor violations of a school rule" (Gregory & Cornell, 2009, p. 107). The increase in the prevalence of zero-tolerance policies has lead to an increase in school exclusion, or the removal of students from the classroom (Achilles, McLaughlin, & Croninger, 2007). Zerotolerance policies are intended to protect students and staff at schools from perceived harm.…”

Special Units for Young People on the Autistic Spectrum in Mainstream Schools: Sites of Normalisation, Abnormalisation, Inclusion, and Exclusion

“…First, that inclusion policy is about increasing the range of mind-body characteristics of those in mainstream schools, not including all learners (Meijer, 2010). Certain groups: those on the Autistic Spectrum (AS), with socio-emotional differences 3 , or profound and multiple disabilities, experience high levels of exclusion from mainstream schools (Achilles et al, 2007). Second, these groups of young people are relatively neglected in research about young people's experiences of school (Slee, 2006; although see Holt, 2010a, b) and objectified in anti-inclusion discourses, which coalesce around these groups (Warnock et al, 2010).…”

Building inclusive education on social and emotional learning: challenges and perspectives – a review

“…Heath et al 2004Heath et al , 2006Visser and Stokes 2003). Data from the US Special Educational Longitudinal Study show that pupils with EBD show a higher likelihood of exclusion than pupils with learning disabilities; students with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) also emerged as a high-exclusion category (Achilles, McLaughlin, and Croninger 2007). Emotional and behavioural problems can adversely affect a child's educational performance, resulting in underachievement, an inability to learn, an inability to build or maintain satisfactory interpersonal relationships with peers and teachers, or inappropriate types of behaviour or feelings under normal circumstances (Trout et al 2003).…”