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Arrested Development: The Pre-school to Suspension Pipeline

I think there is a large communication gap between us. I never claimed that all Black children misbehave.

When I say "men are taller than women", I am not saying all men are taller than all women (which of course, would be a ludicrous claim). It's merely a statement that men have a higher average height than women.



I know that. In fact, I can think of several field studies that could help to disentangle these questions, but they do not appear to have been done.

Examples: In some cultures, it is considered disrespectful for children and younger people to look adults directly in the eye. Yet, most white Americans perceive avoiding eye contact as a sign of deception and dishonesty. And judge accordingly. Which is one reason that Native American kids' suspension rates are so high relative to those of white students.

Students are suspended based upon a teacher's evaluation to a student's behavior. The teacher's evaluation will be influenced by the teacher's perceptions which is also influenced by the teachers' biases, conscious and unconscious.

There is also the fact that teachers and schools mete out discipline based partially on whether or not they feel they have good established relationship with the student's parents. If the teacher/school believes that a phone call to the parents will resolve the problem, discipline often stops there. Notice that this relies heavily on what the teacher/school believes to be true of the parents, not of the child and is not based on actual fact. A teacher may believe that a student who comes from a well educated white family who seems well engaged in the community has more supervision and the parents are heavily invested in the student behaving well/performing well. This may or may not be actually true. The parents may be very vested in appearances and may not actually spend any time with the kid. Contrast with another family who is multigenerational because grandparents and parents are all working and by living in a multigenerational home, the family may provide consistent discipline and supervision. But the school may simply perceive that family as being out of the mainstream, and 'unreliable' because the family doesn't fit a nuclear family 9-5 type of lifestyle. If you throw in perceived language barriers--the school may be inclined to skip the call to the parents and go to higher levels of discipline they would not with a student from the perceived 'ideal' family.

In science, an untested idea is called a hypothesis. If perceptions of family competency affect discipline choices, this is something you can test. You can also test at the same time if these perceptions are biased along race lines.

How does one go about designing such studies? How is data collected?

You'd probably look to the psychological literature for previous designs. A rating experiment would be useful -- videotape children (actors) behaving in a variety of different ways (physically violent, 'insubordination', etc) then get people (preferably child carers but let's face it it would probably be first year psychology students) to rate aspects of the behaviour on a behaviourally-anchored rating scale. The videos of course would have children of either gender and different ethnicities (including at least two children from each 'category') engaging in the 'same' behaviour, as much as practicable.

I would also like an observational study done (it could be done using historical data, if schools keep those records). For example, is there a detailed list of events for which children are suspended? Not the official, one-word reason (e.g. 'insubordination') but a detailed account (e.g. the student rolled their eyes at me and gestured rudely). The second one is not perfect because if White children are not being suspended for the same acts, they won't be in the records (unless they get a lesser punishment which is also recorded).
 
Even if one group misbehaves more than another, that does not mean that more suspensions follow. (hence the little boy who threw a chair and sent a classmate to the hospital and was not suspended)

A little boy is not a group; we don't know if the boy was in the same school or with the same teacher. Individual cases of inconsistency are not indicative unless they're systemic...and we don't know if it's systemic because we don't have the data.
 
I think there is a large communication gap between us. I never claimed that all Black children misbehave.

When I say "men are taller than women", I am not saying all men are taller than all women (which of course, would be a ludicrous claim). It's merely a statement that men have a higher average height than women.



I know that. In fact, I can think of several field studies that could help to disentangle these questions, but they do not appear to have been done.

Examples: In some cultures, it is considered disrespectful for children and younger people to look adults directly in the eye. Yet, most white Americans perceive avoiding eye contact as a sign of deception and dishonesty. And judge accordingly. Which is one reason that Native American kids' suspension rates are so high relative to those of white students.

Students are suspended based upon a teacher's evaluation to a student's behavior. The teacher's evaluation will be influenced by the teacher's perceptions which is also influenced by the teachers' biases, conscious and unconscious.

There is also the fact that teachers and schools mete out discipline based partially on whether or not they feel they have good established relationship with the student's parents. If the teacher/school believes that a phone call to the parents will resolve the problem, discipline often stops there. Notice that this relies heavily on what the teacher/school believes to be true of the parents, not of the child and is not based on actual fact. A teacher may believe that a student who comes from a well educated white family who seems well engaged in the community has more supervision and the parents are heavily invested in the student behaving well/performing well. This may or may not be actually true. The parents may be very vested in appearances and may not actually spend any time with the kid. Contrast with another family who is multigenerational because grandparents and parents are all working and by living in a multigenerational home, the family may provide consistent discipline and supervision. But the school may simply perceive that family as being out of the mainstream, and 'unreliable' because the family doesn't fit a nuclear family 9-5 type of lifestyle. If you throw in perceived language barriers--the school may be inclined to skip the call to the parents and go to higher levels of discipline they would not with a student from the perceived 'ideal' family.

In science, an untested idea is called a hypothesis. If perceptions of family competency affect discipline choices, this is something you can test. You can also test at the same time if these perceptions are biased along race lines.

How does one go about designing such studies? How is data collected?

You'd probably look to the psychological literature for previous designs. A rating experiment would be useful -- videotape children (actors) behaving in a variety of different ways (physically violent, 'insubordination', etc) then get people (preferably child carers but let's face it it would probably be first year psychology students) to rate aspects of the behaviour on a behaviourally-anchored rating scale. The videos of course would have children of either gender and different ethnicities (including at least two children from each 'category') engaging in the 'same' behaviour, as much as practicable.

I would also like an observational study done (it could be done using historical data, if schools keep those records). For example, is there a detailed list of events for which children are suspended? Not the official, one-word reason (e.g. 'insubordination') but a detailed account (e.g. the student rolled their eyes at me and gestured rudely). The second one is not perfect because if White children are not being suspended for the same acts, they won't be in the records (unless they get a lesser punishment which is also recorded).

Do you believe that first year psychology students react the same as classroom teachers?
 
I think there is a large communication gap between us. I never claimed that all Black children misbehave.

When I say "men are taller than women", I am not saying all men are taller than all women (which of course, would be a ludicrous claim). It's merely a statement that men have a higher average height than women.



I know that. In fact, I can think of several field studies that could help to disentangle these questions, but they do not appear to have been done.

Examples: In some cultures, it is considered disrespectful for children and younger people to look adults directly in the eye. Yet, most white Americans perceive avoiding eye contact as a sign of deception and dishonesty. And judge accordingly. Which is one reason that Native American kids' suspension rates are so high relative to those of white students.

Students are suspended based upon a teacher's evaluation to a student's behavior. The teacher's evaluation will be influenced by the teacher's perceptions which is also influenced by the teachers' biases, conscious and unconscious.

There is also the fact that teachers and schools mete out discipline based partially on whether or not they feel they have good established relationship with the student's parents. If the teacher/school believes that a phone call to the parents will resolve the problem, discipline often stops there. Notice that this relies heavily on what the teacher/school believes to be true of the parents, not of the child and is not based on actual fact. A teacher may believe that a student who comes from a well educated white family who seems well engaged in the community has more supervision and the parents are heavily invested in the student behaving well/performing well. This may or may not be actually true. The parents may be very vested in appearances and may not actually spend any time with the kid. Contrast with another family who is multigenerational because grandparents and parents are all working and by living in a multigenerational home, the family may provide consistent discipline and supervision. But the school may simply perceive that family as being out of the mainstream, and 'unreliable' because the family doesn't fit a nuclear family 9-5 type of lifestyle. If you throw in perceived language barriers--the school may be inclined to skip the call to the parents and go to higher levels of discipline they would not with a student from the perceived 'ideal' family.

In science, an untested idea is called a hypothesis. If perceptions of family competency affect discipline choices, this is something you can test. You can also test at the same time if these perceptions are biased along race lines.

How does one go about designing such studies? How is data collected?

You'd probably look to the psychological literature for previous designs. A rating experiment would be useful -- videotape children (actors) behaving in a variety of different ways (physically violent, 'insubordination', etc) then get people (preferably child carers but let's face it it would probably be first year psychology students) to rate aspects of the behaviour on a behaviourally-anchored rating scale. The videos of course would have children of either gender and different ethnicities (including at least two children from each 'category') engaging in the 'same' behaviour, as much as practicable.

I would also like an observational study done (it could be done using historical data, if schools keep those records). For example, is there a detailed list of events for which children are suspended? Not the official, one-word reason (e.g. 'insubordination') but a detailed account (e.g. the student rolled their eyes at me and gestured rudely). The second one is not perfect because if White children are not being suspended for the same acts, they won't be in the records (unless they get a lesser punishment which is also recorded).

Do you believe that first year psychology students react the same as classroom teachers?

I don't know.
 
I think there is a large communication gap between us. I never claimed that all Black children misbehave.

When I say "men are taller than women", I am not saying all men are taller than all women (which of course, would be a ludicrous claim). It's merely a statement that men have a higher average height than women.



I know that. In fact, I can think of several field studies that could help to disentangle these questions, but they do not appear to have been done.

Examples: In some cultures, it is considered disrespectful for children and younger people to look adults directly in the eye. Yet, most white Americans perceive avoiding eye contact as a sign of deception and dishonesty. And judge accordingly. Which is one reason that Native American kids' suspension rates are so high relative to those of white students.

Students are suspended based upon a teacher's evaluation to a student's behavior. The teacher's evaluation will be influenced by the teacher's perceptions which is also influenced by the teachers' biases, conscious and unconscious.

There is also the fact that teachers and schools mete out discipline based partially on whether or not they feel they have good established relationship with the student's parents. If the teacher/school believes that a phone call to the parents will resolve the problem, discipline often stops there. Notice that this relies heavily on what the teacher/school believes to be true of the parents, not of the child and is not based on actual fact. A teacher may believe that a student who comes from a well educated white family who seems well engaged in the community has more supervision and the parents are heavily invested in the student behaving well/performing well. This may or may not be actually true. The parents may be very vested in appearances and may not actually spend any time with the kid. Contrast with another family who is multigenerational because grandparents and parents are all working and by living in a multigenerational home, the family may provide consistent discipline and supervision. But the school may simply perceive that family as being out of the mainstream, and 'unreliable' because the family doesn't fit a nuclear family 9-5 type of lifestyle. If you throw in perceived language barriers--the school may be inclined to skip the call to the parents and go to higher levels of discipline they would not with a student from the perceived 'ideal' family.

In science, an untested idea is called a hypothesis. If perceptions of family competency affect discipline choices, this is something you can test. You can also test at the same time if these perceptions are biased along race lines.

How does one go about designing such studies? How is data collected?

You'd probably look to the psychological literature for previous designs. A rating experiment would be useful -- videotape children (actors) behaving in a variety of different ways (physically violent, 'insubordination', etc) then get people (preferably child carers but let's face it it would probably be first year psychology students) to rate aspects of the behaviour on a behaviourally-anchored rating scale. The videos of course would have children of either gender and different ethnicities (including at least two children from each 'category') engaging in the 'same' behaviour, as much as practicable.

I would also like an observational study done (it could be done using historical data, if schools keep those records). For example, is there a detailed list of events for which children are suspended? Not the official, one-word reason (e.g. 'insubordination') but a detailed account (e.g. the student rolled their eyes at me and gestured rudely). The second one is not perfect because if White children are not being suspended for the same acts, they won't be in the records (unless they get a lesser punishment which is also recorded).

Do you believe that first year psychology students react the same as classroom teachers?

I don't know.


Your first proposed study would yield no data whatsoever regarding whether or not discipline differed because of the race of the student.
 
I think there is a large communication gap between us. I never claimed that all Black children misbehave.

When I say "men are taller than women", I am not saying all men are taller than all women (which of course, would be a ludicrous claim). It's merely a statement that men have a higher average height than women.



I know that. In fact, I can think of several field studies that could help to disentangle these questions, but they do not appear to have been done.

Examples: In some cultures, it is considered disrespectful for children and younger people to look adults directly in the eye. Yet, most white Americans perceive avoiding eye contact as a sign of deception and dishonesty. And judge accordingly. Which is one reason that Native American kids' suspension rates are so high relative to those of white students.

Students are suspended based upon a teacher's evaluation to a student's behavior. The teacher's evaluation will be influenced by the teacher's perceptions which is also influenced by the teachers' biases, conscious and unconscious.

There is also the fact that teachers and schools mete out discipline based partially on whether or not they feel they have good established relationship with the student's parents. If the teacher/school believes that a phone call to the parents will resolve the problem, discipline often stops there. Notice that this relies heavily on what the teacher/school believes to be true of the parents, not of the child and is not based on actual fact. A teacher may believe that a student who comes from a well educated white family who seems well engaged in the community has more supervision and the parents are heavily invested in the student behaving well/performing well. This may or may not be actually true. The parents may be very vested in appearances and may not actually spend any time with the kid. Contrast with another family who is multigenerational because grandparents and parents are all working and by living in a multigenerational home, the family may provide consistent discipline and supervision. But the school may simply perceive that family as being out of the mainstream, and 'unreliable' because the family doesn't fit a nuclear family 9-5 type of lifestyle. If you throw in perceived language barriers--the school may be inclined to skip the call to the parents and go to higher levels of discipline they would not with a student from the perceived 'ideal' family.

In science, an untested idea is called a hypothesis. If perceptions of family competency affect discipline choices, this is something you can test. You can also test at the same time if these perceptions are biased along race lines.

How does one go about designing such studies? How is data collected?

You'd probably look to the psychological literature for previous designs. A rating experiment would be useful -- videotape children (actors) behaving in a variety of different ways (physically violent, 'insubordination', etc) then get people (preferably child carers but let's face it it would probably be first year psychology students) to rate aspects of the behaviour on a behaviourally-anchored rating scale. The videos of course would have children of either gender and different ethnicities (including at least two children from each 'category') engaging in the 'same' behaviour, as much as practicable.

I would also like an observational study done (it could be done using historical data, if schools keep those records). For example, is there a detailed list of events for which children are suspended? Not the official, one-word reason (e.g. 'insubordination') but a detailed account (e.g. the student rolled their eyes at me and gestured rudely). The second one is not perfect because if White children are not being suspended for the same acts, they won't be in the records (unless they get a lesser punishment which is also recorded).

Do you believe that first year psychology students react the same as classroom teachers?

I don't know.


Your first proposed study would yield no data whatsoever regarding whether or not discipline differed because of the race of the student.

You have not understood the design.
 
Even if one group misbehaves more than another, that does not mean that more suspensions follow. (hence the little boy who threw a chair and sent a classmate to the hospital and was not suspended)

A little boy is not a group; we don't know if the boy was in the same school or with the same teacher. Individual cases of inconsistency are not indicative unless they're systemic...and we don't know if it's systemic because we don't have the data.

you don't have the data. But the departments of Justice and the Education have the data and they have pegged a major cause to be racial discrimination.

feel free to read the study they recently released.
 
While you are at it

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/13/school-discipline-race_n_4952322.html

African-American students and students with disabilities are suspended at "hugely disproportionate rates compared to white students," said a report by the Discipline Disparities Research-to-Practice Collaborative, which includes experts from fields such as advocacy, policy, social science and law. Latino students, girls of color, and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students also were disproportionately suspended -- a punishment the report said increases dropout risks and helps push troubled students out of classrooms and into the justice system.

"We already knew that African Americans were disproportionately affected, but this new research is also saying that it's also Latino students, it's also students with disabilities, it's also girls of color," said Russell Skiba, the Indiana University professor who directed the project. "LGBT students may be at risk for increased discipline. These things have a big effect on achievement."




The researchers found that black students were 1.78 times as likely to be suspended out of school as white students. Latino students' suspension odds were 2.23 times greater than those of white students. Students with disabilities were suspended at twice the rate of their non-disabled peers, and for longer durations. Worse, 25 percent of black students with disabilities received at least one out-of-school suspension in the 2009-2010 school year.

Research shows that removing so-called "bad kids" from the classroom doesn't help non-disruptive kids learn, according to the collaborative. The group found that some restorative justice programs and prevention programs that call for more student-teacher engagement can help lower suspension rates and minimize disruptions. The researchers also found that school police often make arrests for “what might otherwise be considered adolescent misbehaviors.”

To reach these conclusions, the group relied on research studies, as well as data from the U.S. Education Department. “Several studies indicate … that racial disparities are not sufficiently explained by the theory that black or other minority students are simply misbehaving more," the collaborative wrote.
 
I think there is a large communication gap between us. I never claimed that all Black children misbehave.

When I say "men are taller than women", I am not saying all men are taller than all women (which of course, would be a ludicrous claim). It's merely a statement that men have a higher average height than women.



I know that. In fact, I can think of several field studies that could help to disentangle these questions, but they do not appear to have been done.

Examples: In some cultures, it is considered disrespectful for children and younger people to look adults directly in the eye. Yet, most white Americans perceive avoiding eye contact as a sign of deception and dishonesty. And judge accordingly. Which is one reason that Native American kids' suspension rates are so high relative to those of white students.

Students are suspended based upon a teacher's evaluation to a student's behavior. The teacher's evaluation will be influenced by the teacher's perceptions which is also influenced by the teachers' biases, conscious and unconscious.

There is also the fact that teachers and schools mete out discipline based partially on whether or not they feel they have good established relationship with the student's parents. If the teacher/school believes that a phone call to the parents will resolve the problem, discipline often stops there. Notice that this relies heavily on what the teacher/school believes to be true of the parents, not of the child and is not based on actual fact. A teacher may believe that a student who comes from a well educated white family who seems well engaged in the community has more supervision and the parents are heavily invested in the student behaving well/performing well. This may or may not be actually true. The parents may be very vested in appearances and may not actually spend any time with the kid. Contrast with another family who is multigenerational because grandparents and parents are all working and by living in a multigenerational home, the family may provide consistent discipline and supervision. But the school may simply perceive that family as being out of the mainstream, and 'unreliable' because the family doesn't fit a nuclear family 9-5 type of lifestyle. If you throw in perceived language barriers--the school may be inclined to skip the call to the parents and go to higher levels of discipline they would not with a student from the perceived 'ideal' family.

In science, an untested idea is called a hypothesis. If perceptions of family competency affect discipline choices, this is something you can test. You can also test at the same time if these perceptions are biased along race lines.

How does one go about designing such studies? How is data collected?

You'd probably look to the psychological literature for previous designs. A rating experiment would be useful -- videotape children (actors) behaving in a variety of different ways (physically violent, 'insubordination', etc) then get people (preferably child carers but let's face it it would probably be first year psychology students) to rate aspects of the behaviour on a behaviourally-anchored rating scale. The videos of course would have children of either gender and different ethnicities (including at least two children from each 'category') engaging in the 'same' behaviour, as much as practicable.

I would also like an observational study done (it could be done using historical data, if schools keep those records). For example, is there a detailed list of events for which children are suspended? Not the official, one-word reason (e.g. 'insubordination') but a detailed account (e.g. the student rolled their eyes at me and gestured rudely). The second one is not perfect because if White children are not being suspended for the same acts, they won't be in the records (unless they get a lesser punishment which is also recorded).

Do you believe that first year psychology students react the same as classroom teachers?

I don't know.


Your first proposed study would yield no data whatsoever regarding whether or not discipline differed because of the race of the student.

You have not understood the design.

Yes I have.

Your study would rely on the degree to which first year psychology students viewing tapes of scripted scenes portrayed by actors was analogous to the actions and reactions of actual teachers of varying degrees of experience in a variety of real life situations, counting on a strong correlation between your study subjects and the behavior and reactions taken by actual teacher in response to actual events involving actual children in a variety of settings. You've already stated that you do not know if the first year psychology students would react in the same manner as teachers would react. Especially problematic as the first year psych students would certainly be aware that they were watching scripted performances by actors, not videotapes of actual incidents.

I wasn't asking how you would design a study to see if, in theory, the race of children affected the type and severity of discipline meted out but how to actually collect real data of incidents that have actually happened. Your study would be speculative and would not actually include data of actual incidents that have happened.

Which is a little ironic as you are insisting that the links you have been provided don't give enough detail about the comparisons of situations/students/discipline, etc. although you are unwilling or unable (I don't fault you: I haven't the links to detailed data--I'm just pointing out your criticisms) to find links to the details of the recently released study.

Your study might be interesting as a step to determine whether race of children affects the perception of their behavior when viewed on videotape by students. But it doesn't actually count or compare detailed incident reports, according to race/ethnicity, etc.

As you have pointed out in the second proposed study, students who received low levels of discipline/no discipline for behavior would not even appear in the study.
 
Even if one group misbehaves more than another, that does not mean that more suspensions follow. (hence the little boy who threw a chair and sent a classmate to the hospital and was not suspended)

A little boy is not a group; we don't know if the boy was in the same school or with the same teacher. Individual cases of inconsistency are not indicative unless they're systemic...and we don't know if it's systemic because we don't have the data.

you don't have the data. But the departments of Justice and the Education have the data and they have pegged a major cause to be racial discrimination.

feel free to read the study they recently released.

They said it, in the article, but I can't find the data that is evidence for it. What was the data they used to show that Black children were punished more harshly for similar violations?
 
Yes I have.

Your study would rely on the degree to which first year psychology students viewing tapes of scripted scenes portrayed by actors was analogous to the actions and reactions of actual teachers of varying degrees of experience in a variety of real life situations,

I'm not here to defend a design I came up with in one minute, but generalising from experimentee behaviour to apply to preschool situations is certainly no more out there than generalising from jury behaviour to apply to preschool situations -- which has already been done on this thread.

counting on a strong correlation between your study subjects and the behavior and reactions taken by actual teacher in response to actual events involving actual children in a variety of settings. You've already stated that you do not know if the first year psychology students would react in the same manner as teachers would react. Especially problematic as the first year psych students would certainly be aware that they were watching scripted performances by actors, not videotapes of actual incidents.

Of course they're going to know that; that is not fatal to the design. Indeed, if you removed this kind of design, half of the social psychology literature would disappear.

I wasn't asking how you would design a study to see if, in theory, the race of children affected the type and severity of discipline meted out but how to actually collect real data of incidents that have actually happened. Your study would be speculative and would not actually include data of actual incidents that have happened.

You don't say. It's an experiment, not a field study. Experiments allow us to make much stronger conclusions about cause and effect.

Which is a little ironic as you are insisting that the links you have been provided don't give enough detail about the comparisons of situations/students/discipline, etc. although you are unwilling or unable (I don't fault you: I haven't the links to detailed data--I'm just pointing out your criticisms) to find links to the details of the recently released study.

I did follow the links. I did read the story. I did read the claim. But they did not explain how they arrived at their conclusion. And so far, no one here is willing or able to tell me they arrived at their conclusion.

Your study might be interesting as a step to determine whether race of children affects the perception of their behavior when viewed on videotape by students. But it doesn't actually count or compare detailed incident reports, according to race/ethnicity, etc.

As you have pointed out in the second proposed study, students who received low levels of discipline/no discipline for behavior would not even appear in the study.

Since you now appear to be taking the role of a PhD proposal examiner, I'll amend my 'dream' study. I assume ethics and practicality is no restraint, so we'll put secret videocameras in a stratified sample of preschools across America, and we will tape every single classroom interaction, document all behaviours by all children, and cross-reference that with a list of suspensions from the same classes, for five years.
 
Research shows that removing so-called "bad kids" from the classroom doesn't help non-disruptive kids learn

I don't care if it hindered learning of the remaining kids, you can't leave physically violent children in the classroom.

To reach these conclusions, the group relied on research studies, as well as data from the U.S. Education Department. “Several studies indicate … that racial disparities are not sufficiently explained by the theory that black or other minority students are simply misbehaving more," the collaborative wrote.

Which studies and how did they get to that conclusion?
 
Even if one group misbehaves more than another, that does not mean that more suspensions follow. (hence the little boy who threw a chair and sent a classmate to the hospital and was not suspended)

A little boy is not a group; we don't know if the boy was in the same school or with the same teacher. Individual cases of inconsistency are not indicative unless they're systemic...and we don't know if it's systemic because we don't have the data.

you don't have the data. But the departments of Justice and the Education have the data and they have pegged a major cause to be racial discrimination.

feel free to read the study they recently released.

They said it, in the article, but I can't find the data that is evidence for it. What was the data they used to show that Black children were punished more harshly for similar violations?

http://ocrdata.ed.gov/

enjoy. All the data in one place.

Have fun.

Also

http://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/letters/colleague-201401-title-vi.pdf

Page 5 footnote 7 will be of particular interest to you.
 
Also

http://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/letters/colleague-201401-title-vi.pdf

Page 5 footnote 7 will be of particular interest to you.

Finally!

Okay, I read the first paper in the footnote (ANTECEDENTS OF THE “SCHOOL-TO-JAIL” LINK here). The authors collected a number of variables and used regression models to hold constant the influence of each factor. Unfortunately, the authors did not have a very sensitive measure of socioeconomic status (it was either 'eligible for free school lunch' or not), but having that measure included was certainly better than nothing.

So, what do the authors find? Black students, when holding constant all other variables (actual misbehaviour, gender, age, etc, etc) are about 20% more likely to receive a referral to the principal than White students. That additional 20% is not explained by the measures they included. In other words, there does seem to be a racial bias.

But -- and this is important -- the factor that influenced referrals the most was actual misbehaviour. Many other factors 'outranked' being Black in getting a disciplinary referral, including having English as a second language, being in special education, age, grades, and gender.

So racial bias actually appears to explain only a small part of the disciplinary gap. In that study, Black students were more than twice as likely to get a disciplinary referral compared to a White student, but most of this was explained by the other, non-race factors. If Black and White students were exactly alike in all the factors presented in the model, Black students would only get 20% more referrals, not more than double.

So yes, it's a concern that there appears to be a racial bias when disciplining students (in fact, Asian students were less likely to be disciplined that Whites, when holding constant all the other factors), but most of the disciplining difference in the study was found to be accounted for by non-race factors. However, it's downright deceptive to use the uncorrected 'raw numbers' approach when talking about the gap, as if the whole gap was due to racial bias, instead of only a fraction of it.
 
Also

http://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/letters/colleague-201401-title-vi.pdf

Page 5 footnote 7 will be of particular interest to you.

Finally!

Okay, I read the first paper in the footnote (ANTECEDENTS OF THE “SCHOOL-TO-JAIL” LINK here). The authors collected a number of variables and used regression models to hold constant the influence of each factor. Unfortunately, the authors did not have a very sensitive measure of socioeconomic status (it was either 'eligible for free school lunch' or not), but having that measure included was certainly better than nothing.

So, what do the authors find? Black students, when holding constant all other variables (actual misbehaviour, gender, age, etc, etc) are about 20% more likely to receive a referral to the principal than White students. That additional 20% is not explained by the measures they included. In other words, there does seem to be a racial bias.

But -- and this is important -- the factor that influenced referrals the most was actual misbehaviour. Many other factors 'outranked' being Black in getting a disciplinary referral, including having English as a second language, being in special education, age, grades, and gender.

So racial bias actually appears to explain only a small part of the disciplinary gap. In that study, Black students were more than twice as likely to get a disciplinary referral compared to a White student, but most of this was explained by the other, non-race factors. If Black and White students were exactly alike in all the factors presented in the model, Black students would only get 20% more referrals, not more than double.

So yes, it's a concern that there appears to be a racial bias when disciplining students (in fact, Asian students were less likely to be disciplined that Whites, when holding constant all the other factors), but most of the disciplining difference in the study was found to be accounted for by non-race factors. However, it's downright deceptive to use the uncorrected 'raw numbers' approach when talking about the gap, as if the whole gap was due to racial bias, instead of only a fraction of it.

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