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K-12 Dive
How is COVID-19 changing school discipline?
Long-standing school discipline practices were impacted by the
pandemic. Here are some ways they have stayed the same and ways they
are changing.
Naaz Modan
Jan. 22, 2021
Before March 2020, inequitable school discipline practices were a major concern for advocates and educators alike.
"There was a real discipline crisis" for students with disabilities and
students of color, said Wendy Tucker, senior director of policy for the
National Center for Special Education in Charter Schools and a former
member of the Tennessee State Board of Education.
Most recent numbers from the U.S. Department of Education's Civil
Rights Data Collection show while students with disabilities served
under IDEA make up 13% of the total enrolled student population in the
country, they represented the majority of students who were physically
restrained and secluded in 2017-18. And while K-12 schools overall have
decreased use of out-of-school suspensions, Black learners and students
with disabilities remained twice as likely as their peers to be
suspended, according to Child Trends' analysis of federal data from
2011-2016.
But like many other areas of education, long-standing school discipline
practices were impacted by the coronavirus pandemic. Here are some ways
they have stayed the same and are changing.
Online discipline hard to implement
Remote settings have made traditional disciplinary measures more challenging.
"When you're in-person, you have access to more coercion tools,"
consultant Mike Paget said, adding he doesn't necessarily support such
methods. "For example, [take] proximity influence, where a teacher
walks up into the area of students who are not as engaged as they need
to be. That can be both effective and it can be intimidating." Paget's
work involves helping schools with students' emotional and behavioral
challenges.
There are also more punitive measures being taken despite current remote or hybrid learning models.
"We’re hearing a lot of disturbing things," Tucker said, referring to
an incident in October when a 9-year-old Louisiana student was almost
expelled after a teacher reported seeing a gun in the child's bedroom.
"But we’re also hearing things about kids, when they act up on a Zoom,
being put into a Zoom breakout room as sort of an in-school suspension."
Teachers, Tucker said, are also muting microphones or turning off
students' cameras. "While that makes sense when you see a teacher
struggling with 26 students on video, it’s an easier solution," she
said. "It’s a removal of that child from the educational environment
and the data needs to be collected.”
Not everyone supports utilizing these types of punitive approaches with the tools at hand, however.
"I don't think that the technology should be used to create an
alternative learning environment because of a suspension or expulsion.
I believe that there has to be some equity in the implementation of
[technology]," said John Jackson, president and CEO of the Schott
Foundation for Public Education, which raises funds for racial and
educational justice movements. Jackson also was the senior policy
advisor in the Office for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of
Education under the Clinton administration. He said he worries that
using technology to create an alternative, remote learning environment
could promote punitive discipline.
Andy Jacks, principal of Ashland Elementary School in Manassas,
Virginia, said he is trying to remind educators to "look at the big
picture." "You can’t overreact in these situations when you’re in their
home [virtually]," Jacks said.
Schools 'doubling down' on relationships
Many educators and others say the pandemic — and the resulting social
isolation, stress and other negative implications on mental health —
has led to an uptick in social-emotional awareness. Schools across the
nation made a concerted effort to leverage their time and resources to
check in with students, ensuring their physical and mental health needs
were met.
With remote learning in play, there should be a decrease in the number
of students being suspended or expelled, said Jackson. "I think it
would be more difficult to punish a student virtually," he said.
Instead, schools are "doubling down" on relationships, said Jordan
Posamentier, director of policy and advocacy at Committee for Children,
a nonprofit that designs SEL programs. “With a different setting,
there's a lot of opportunity here — to the point where I think some
school districts realize they can press the 'reset' button in a way
that would’ve been harder had they kept going in school and tried to
shift gears in the same settings under the same conditions,” he added.
Multi-tiered systems of supports, which were gaining traction as an
alternative solution to punitive discipline prior to the pandemic, have
become even more important, Posamentier said.
Paget echoed that a remote environment requires "an even greater
emphasis" on relationship-building, "where [students] actually miss you
if you don't check in with them," he said.
Likewise, the pandemic has improved relationships between many teachers
and parents, in some cases, as a result of their increased
collaboration, Tucker said.
More ideas for keeping kids in classrooms
An American Civil Liberties Union analysis of federal data from the
2015-16 school year showed students collectively lost close to 11
million school days that year — or roughly 66 million hours of
instruction — as a result of out-of-school suspensions, with Black
students and children with disabilities disproportionally impacted when
compared to their peers.
With steep learning losses predicted as a result of the pandemic,
education leaders stress the importance of having as much time for
instruction as possible, now and when they return full-time to
buildings.
"Say a kid is [in school] two days a week; you can’t suspend them for a day," Jacks said. "That’s pretty staggering."
He expressed the need to reform many longstanding practices in
education, including discipline and class sizes, which he said are
inextricably linked.
Jacks also said he has noticed that reducing class sizes in the wake of
COVID-19 has made school discipline "tremendously easier." "In fact,
I’m seeing that we could solve a huge amount of our disciplinary issues
if we could just reduce class size," he added.
Likewise, the principal said schools can be be more lenient on minor
school policies like dress codes, adding it's about picking and
choosing to discipline behaviors "that really interfere with learning."
Tucker, a former lawyer, said health concerns and requirements like
mask-wearing, combined with increased behavioral challenges as a result
of heightened trauma and anxiety, could lead to more suspensions and
other disciplinary actions for students now in-person full time or in
hybrid models.
"You think about the kid with the mask who has a hard time wearing it,
and in school you have a 60-year-old educator who is diabetic and is in
the high-risk category," Tucker said. "You can’t really blame them if
they don’t want to be around a screaming kid without a mask.”
To help avoid such situations, Tucker said educators should reach out
to families before in-person learning resumes to identify and mitigate
potential challenges. "So by the time they come into the building, you
have collaborated with the family to set you up for success," she said.
Ongoing challenges remain
In New York's Buffalo Public Schools, where leadership is in the midst
of adopting new disciplinary policies including restorative justice
practices, the local teachers union released a survey highlighting its
concerns. In their responses, teachers claim physical altercations,
verbal profanities and threats to safety, among other incidents, were
met with limited to no disciplinary action. Buffalo Teachers Federation
President Philip Rumore said that kind of response to misbehavior
"sends the message to the other students that the behavior is
acceptable."
"It’s not the panacea," Rumore said of restorative justice. "However,
it can work if it is done with fidelity — if there is proper training
with teachers, if there is support of the principal, and if there is
time to do it." He also said a lack of school psychologists and
counselors poses hurdles to successful implementation.
Tonja Williams, the district's associate superintendent of student
support services, told local news outlet WKBW the program "will work,"
but "it will just take some time for everyone to be implementing it
with fidelity."
Education leaders have said a systemwide shift away from punitive
discipline and toward restorative justice and other practices takes
time and resources — luxuries many districts are short on.
"You're not going to expect a night-and-day turnaround," Posamentier
said, "but every little bit is something that a school can do." Even
one SEL lesson a day could help educators and students work on
self-regulation and build coping skills, he added.
SEL experts and educators have also said the need to start early and
with community support — if there’s a troubled student, quite often
there are troubled families.
"I think sometimes schools want to take on all of it at once and it
becomes overwhelming," Posamentier added. "You don't have to do that.
It's one lesson at a time, one relationship at a time, and that
accumulates where I think there's a lot to be done without boiling the
ocean."
Read this and other articles at K-12 Dive here
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