By: Diane Benjamin
h/t a reader for calling this to my attention
In 2015 Illinois passed a law (Senate Bill 100) that was supposed to end discriminatory student discipline policies.
How is it working?
See this report from 2024: https://ieanea.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Impact-of-Student-Discipline-Policy-Reform-on-Illinois-Educators-1-17-2024_Final.pdf
Go to the bottom of page 5 to see what teachers think of this bill:
Page 6:
The Illinois State Board of Education has been tracking school districts to see if racial disparities exist in discipline. See this link: https://www.isbe.net/Pages/Culturally-Sensitive-and-Responsive-Teaching.aspx
The following data is from the marked file.
Look at the far right column. Did Unit 5 realize in 2022 more discipline was needed? From 2022-2024 they are in the top 20% for racial disproportionate rate.
District 87 is doing the opposite. They started in the top 20% and fell off during COVID.
If skin color determines what discipline a student receives, that is the opposite of social justice. Discrimination is created when discipline is handed out only based on skin color. Not expecting self discipline by all students leads to chaos.
Go back to the teacher’s comments on what Senate Bill 100 did to their environment. Why would anyone want to teach?
What is really happening in our local schools?
The result is the good teachers are frustrated and tired of dealing with it. They are being forced to give up a profession they love and move to another career. The result is more and more public schools are being led by those who stay because they cannot find another job.
Most students have no choice in what school they attend and eventually become a victim of the system. Society will suffer the consequences of schools turning out undisciplined and uneducated students.
@Country Bumpkin – very well stated!
Folks we know who love teaching are definitely frustrated and leaving teaching for a different career. And as you stated, we all suffer.
Seven years ago the State told districts that they must begin to use Social Emotional Learning and have the DEI experiment in every classroom. This was supposed to solve all the problems. Discipline would be down, behavior and academic achievement would improve. The everyone will thrive.
Some districts made a halfhearted attempt, but Unit 5 went all in with a DEI department. Discipline would be race based. If there was a disparity, there was a racial systemic problem in your school. The teachers or the system would be to blame.
Unit 5’s discipline goal in their Equity Audit of 2021 –
6: DISCIPLINE/BEHAVIOR/STUDENT SUPPORTS – Our district regularly analyzes student discipline data and disaggregates said data by race and special population categories, as well as intersectionality of known social constructs. We have proactive practices in place (e.g., restorative justice, trauma-informed resources, SEL approaches, etc.) to support all students, especially historically marginalized populations.
After 7 years of this, Unit 5 is on probation so to speak. 3 consecutive years in the top 20% of the state’s poor performers means they have to make a special action plan to solve the problem. Is it more of the same? Probably.
DEI/SEL is failing miserably by all metrics, but we keep dropping our children off at the doorway where neither they nor their teachers feel safe and can thrive. When will parents realize it and rescue their children? They are the only ones that can.
Well said!
All of this is happening alongside HB 2827 that is attempting to curtail homeschool freedom. Almost 50,000 witness slips signed in opposition to it and still the Democrats pass it out of committee, simply because they want to. They want people stuck in the public schools.
Diane looking at your data is further proof that what they are doing is an absolute failure.
Not only is there increased racial disparity in discipline but overall discipline problems are increasing drastically. Academic achievement gets an F but cost per student is through the roof.
Where is the parental outrage?
2017 2024 % change
Total Enrollment U5 13,554 12,357 -9%
Total Enrollment D87 5,249 4,610 -12%
Total Suspensions U5 360 1007 180%
Total Suspensions D87 287 655 128%
Total Enrollment Unit 5: Decreased by approximately 8.83% from 2017 to 2024.
Total Enrollment D 87: Decreased by approximately 12.17% from 2017 to 2024.
Total Suspensions Unit 5: Increased by approximately 179.72% from 2017 to 2024.
Total Suspensions D 87: Increased by approximately 128.22% from 2017 to 2024.
Probably hard to read, but I couldn’t do anything about it.
At the risk of sounding negative it’s too late for fixing our educational system.
The problem started years ago on our college campuses the liberal headset has over time infiltrated all aspects of our public educational system. This goes from kindergarten through high school. The people that control our public schools can’t or won’t focus on teaching the basics it’s all about feel good and they have dumbed many students down. Of course one has to look at the overall performance of our students and ask oneself why are the results so low. Unfortunately those that have contributed to this dismal performance will never be held accountable and that is why these problems will never be fixed.
All one has to do is listen to the current liberal demonrats throwing a fit because Trump is closing down the federal government educational heads and putting the responsibility back on the states. Gee these people can’t possibly be responsible for our poor educational results