Working Inside the Gate: School Discipline on Post

Abstract

Racial and ethnic disparities in school discipline in the United States have been well researched, and explanations often highlight the role of structural inequality in explaining these trends. Research has yet to examine disparities in school discipline within a population for which structural inequalities are relatively accounted. Using data from a high school located on a US military installation, we examine patterns of discipline within this sample, representing a population of students whose parents have steady employment, housing, health care, counseling, and childcare. Findings indicate racial and ethnic disparities in discipline are minimal due to the military culture, access to resources, and focus on rehabilitative discipline.

Colorblind Policy in a Carceral Geography: Reclaiming Public Education

“…Moreover, even when districts attempt to address the roots of racial disparities in exclusionary discipline – for example, by limiting school actors’ punishments of students for behaviors that stem from trauma – their responses are often narrow and compliance driven. Shifts from punitive toward rehabilitative policies have only achieved decreases in racial and ethnic disparities in districts with low levels of structural inequality (Mowen et al, 2017). As such, policymakers interested in addressing equity should follow four steps to design race conscious policies that address the structural causes of inequity.…”