Posted on 03/24/2014 6:02:10 AM PDT by YourAdHere
Even preschoolers are getting suspended from U.S. public schools—and they're disproportionately Black, a trend that continues up through the later grades.
Data released March 21 by the Education Department's civil rights arm finds that Black children represent about 18 percent of children enrolled in preschool programs in schools, but almost half of the students were suspended more than once. Six percent of the nation's districts with preschools reported suspending at least one preschool child.
Advocates have long said that get-tough suspension and arrest policies in schools have contributed to a "school-to-prison" pipeline that snags minority students, but much of the emphasis has been on middle school and high school policies. This data shows the disparities starting in the youngest of children.
Earlier this year, the Obama administration issued guidance encouraging schools to abandon what it described as overly zealous discipline policies that send students to court instead of the principal's office. But, even before the announcement, school districts have been adjusting policies that disproportionately affect minority students.
Overall, the data shows that Black students of all ages are suspended and expelled at a rate that's three times higher than that of White children. Even as boys receive more than two-thirds of suspensions, Black girls are suspended at higher rates than girls of any other race or most boys.
The data doesn't explain why the disparities exist or why the students were suspended. Education Secretary Arne Duncan and Attorney General Eric Holder were scheduled to appear at J.O. Wilson Elementary School on March 21 in Washington to discuss the data.
Nationally, one million children were served in public preschool programs, with about 60 percent of districts offering preschool during the 2011-2012 school year, according to the data. The data shows nearly 5,000 preschoolers suspended once. At least 2,500 were suspended more than once.
Daniel Losen, director of the Center for Civil Rights Remedies for the Civil Rights Project at UCLA, said the findings are disturbing because the suspended preschoolers aren't likely presenting a danger, such as teenager bringing a gun to school.
"Almost none of these kids are kids that wouldn't be better off with some support from educators," Losen said. "Just kicking them out of school is denying them access to educational opportunity at such a young age. Then, as they come in for kindergarten, they are just that much less prepared."
Losen said it's appropriate to discipline a 4-year-old, but a more appropriate response might be moving them to a different educational setting with additional services.
"Most preschool kids want to be in school," Losen said. "Kids just don't understand why they can't go to school."
Judith Browne Dianis, co-director of the Advancement Project, a think tank that specializes in social issues affecting minority communities, has been advocating against the overly zealous use of suspensions against African American students. Unfortunately, she said it didn't surprise her to hear that even younger black students were being kicked out of school at a high rate.
"I think most people would be shocked that those numbers would be true in preschool, because we think of 4- and 5-years-olds as being innocent," she said. "But we do know that schools are using zero tolerance policies for our youngest also, that while we think our children need a head start, schools are kicking them out instead."
That's the way it USED to be....................
There is one evil cause for this and I blame LBJ. What you subsidize, you get more of.
He was the one who starting paying low income mothers to NOT GET MARRIED. In my area we have plenty of whites doing it, also. They will freely tell you they aren’t marrying their baby’s fathers so they get more money from the government. The schools are disastrous. I am firmly convinced the moment you take the father’s out of the home, at a very deep level the child starts to feel a deep deprivation and a loss of security.
These poor kids have hurdles to overcome from they day they are born with a stable Dad. Any rational society will see and target that, but we’ve lost our brains, haven’t we?
Interesting article. This sentence struck me. They want to take guns away from law abiding citizens yet there is no aggressive action to take guns away from black teens.
I have seen what a 4 or 5 year old, undisciplined child can do. The hit, they kick, they spit, they slap other kids. If the other kid is of the same type, it becomes a free-for-all. If another kid has something like a toy or other item that they want, they just take it.........................We used to call these types ‘bullies’. Now they are ‘disadvantaged’........................
What’s the statistic ... 75% of Black children are born into a single parent home environment?
Mrs BN used to teach 4 year olds. Whenever they had an unruly kid in another class (including one who was being taught by his own mother - go figure), they would move that child to my wife’s class. Within a few weeks she usually had the kid straightened out.
I call Mrs BN, “SHE WHO MUST BE OBEYED!” (spoken in my best Godzilla film narrator voice)
[Hey, she keeps me in line - :-) ]
They were bullies when our culture recognized the truth of human nature - that evil comes from within.
They became "disadvantaged" when the leftist/humanist worldview became dominant in our culture. If the human is "basically good", then any evil he does must be in reaction to bad things being done to him.
The secret word is ETIQUETTE. Worked for Tarzan. :)
They are the children and grandchildren of LBJ.
Disproportionate - illegitimacy rate, shooting rate, dropout rate, crime rate, illiteracy rate, AIDS rate.
No correlation, certainly. None of it possibly their doing.
Proving that civility is a matter of culture, not color.
***
Exactly. It is not a racial attribute. There is, unfortunately, a subculture that produces these ill-mannered children. Focus needs to be put on strengthening morality.
Some of the so called black leadership has called for separate schools for black students, it’s one of the few things I agree with.
Government policy is the opposite - it is centered around destroying morality, the family, fatherhood, responsibility, etc.
The money quote.
That's the way it USED to be....................
Really! Wouldn't it be great if it was that way again? The way things are going now..."At some point we will get to a point where all children are handed to the state at birth..." is more like it. :-(
It’s one of those things they say they want, but really don’t, because they know what such a policy would expose.
Of course, they might want to go ahead and go through with it, demanding more and more and more “funding” for these schools because the kids continue to fail despite being put in a good environment.
+1
We were once watching a David Blaine special - you know, the street magician that wanders around doing magic on street corners.
It was so funny - a white crowd would gather, and they would ooh and ahh. A bunch of white guys would gather, and they would chuckle and say, oh man.
A bunch of blacks would gather and they would start to scream at the top of their lungs and run around in circles. If there were men there they would smack other people’s bodies, including the women, while howling.
It was absolutely predictable.
To add another culture to the mix, I’ve seen Asian crowds gather for demonstrations and they will usually be very quiet but get very forward to try and figure out the mechanics of what is going on -even the women will start using their hands to try and visualize what is happening in a way white women don’t.
The difference is, we think this is cultural, but liberals insist everything is socioeconomic and pointing out such things means we must be racist. We just see it as pointing out truth and logic.
You definitely have my respect. Best of luck in your career. I hope all works out for you.
Ask a lib why people behave badly and make bad choices.
You’ll notice that their answer is always that such behavior and choices is a result of reaction to external influences rather than the internal (sin) nature of every human.
I’m cogitating on why it is so important to a leftist/liberal/humanist to reject the internal fallen nature of the human condition,
and I think a part of it is that they’d have to recognize
THEIR OWN
fallen nature and the futility of trying to do something about it on their own.
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