Discipline

Matthew Lynch published in Ask An Expert, Matthew Lynch, Policy & Reform, Teachers

Ask An Expert: Ending Corporal Punishment in Schools

Question: I recently moved from New Jersey to a small town in Louisiana. To my amazement and horror, my children’s elementary school still uses corporal punishment. Fortunately, it is an opt in system, but if parents do not consent to its use, their children are automatically suspended, whether it is in school or at home. What does research say about the effects of corporal punishment? What can we do to end this deplorable practice? Marcia E.

Answer: First of all, thank you for your question. It’s difficult to believe in this day and age that we still have some schools around the nation that are using corporal punishment as a form of discipline. At this point, there are only 19 states that now allow corporal punishment, which is allowing the school to use physical punishment on a child. Such punishment usually includes a spanking of some kind, typically done with a wooden paddle. Although not allowed in the majority of states, it is reported that there are over 200,000 children who are victims of it each year around the country. It’s difficult to imagine that so many children are going home throughout the school year with welts, bruises, and broken vessels, as punishment for something they did in school.

Spankings themselves, as well as corporal punishment, are controversial topics at best. There is a lot of evidence and research that has pointed to the fact that spanking as a form of punishment, at any age, can be problematic. We as a society need to be aware of this research, especially when it comes to it still being allowed in the schools of 19 of our states. Here’s some of the most troubling aspects of corporal punishment in schools:

• Research indicates that children who are disciplined with spanking go on to have more mental illness as adults. Spanking has been linked to children becoming adults who not only have mental health issues, but also experience more depression, and have problems with substance abuse.
• Spanking children is also believed to make them become adults who are more aggressive, antisocial, and who go on to abuse their own spouse and children.
• As a nation, we are concerned with our high school drop out rates. This makes me wonder how many adults would want to continue showing up at their jobs if they knew they would be paddled if they didn’t perform their jobs correctly. Perhaps if students were not being paddled, they may hang in there a while longer and take to their studies a little better.

Corporal punishment may be under attack, but until we outlaw it from every state in the country, we will have the problems associated with it each year. And those problems, as we have discussed, are far reaching and long lasting. They impact us as a society long after the child has completed their schooling.

While the Supreme Court allows corporal punishment in whatever states and school districts have it legally on the books, this is a matter of ethics. We as a nation need to do what is right by the next generation. By the looks of it, if corporal punishment continues in the 19 states it is currently allowed in, we will be raising a lot of children who may go on to have mental illnesses, be more aggressive, abuse their spouses, and have addiction problems.

Once they are adults, society can point the finger at them and say that it’s their own fault, and they have created the problems in their life by the choices they have made. But if we can agree that the writing is on the wall, and the potential long term impact is there, then we may need to start pointing a few fingers at the schools, as they are using a form of punishment that experts agree goes on to create more unwanted behavior.

Now is the time for parents around the nation, especially those who live in states where corporal punishment is still allowed, to take a stand. It’s time that we focus on more peaceful and less harmful ways to teach the children of the nation right from wrong. Getting rid of the paddles in the schools of this nation is a great place to start.

 

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Matthew Lynch published in Equity, Policy & Reform

With harsher disciplinary measures, school systems fail black kids

**The Edvocate is pleased to publish guest posts as way to fuel important conversations surrounding P-20 education in America. The opinions contained within guest posts are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official opinion of The Edvocate or Dr. Matthew Lynch.**

Esther Canty-Barnes, Rutgers University Newark

Although it has been over 60 years since the Brown v Board of Education decision, black students are still more likely to receive out-of-school suspensions for minor violations of the code of conduct. As a result, they are more likely to drop out of school or enter the juvenile justice system.

Black students constituted 32%-42% of those suspended during the 2011-12 school year, even though they represented 16% of the student population.

As racial tensions resurface in the aftermath of the conflicts and riots in Ferguson and Baltimore, we need to consider whether some of these issues have their origins in the manner in which children of color are treated in our schools.

As a clinical professor of law at the Rutgers University Law School’s Education and Health Law Clinic, I provide legal representation to parents and their children in cases where they are being denied an appropriate education or are suspended from school.

This includes filing legal complaints, attending meetings and assessing the appropriateness of a student’s educational program. At the clinic, my colleagues and I have seen firsthand the disparities in the treatment and resources provided by schools. And often, I have seen that suspension of young black students begins as early as kindergarten.

Educational inequities for black kids

Our educational system continues to fail children of color.

Research shows that black males are disproportionately more likely to be placed in special education and classified as mentally retarded and emotionally disturbed.

They are also more likely to be placed in segregated placements, more likely to be educated in poorly performing schools and more likely to be referred to the juvenile justice system for infractions that occur in school.

They are also the least likely to be provided the positive supports and the assistance that they need in order to succeed.

None of this is new.

Children of color have historically been subjected to educational inequities. After the landmark decision of Brown v Board of Education in 1954, where the Supreme Court held that it was unconstitutional to maintain segregated schools, practices and policies were developed to maintain segregated settings.

States in the South refused to comply with Brown, while other parts of the country developed practices such as IQ testing and tracking students into specific programs that often kept children of color in different classes from their white counterparts.

The Children’s Defense Fund (CDF), headed by Marian Wright Edelman, was one of the first organizations to look at the disparities in access to education. In its groundbreaking report in 1975, “School Suspensions: Are They Helping Children?,” the CDF analyzed the reports submitted to the Office of Civil Rights.

Although black students accounted for 27.1% of the students enrolled in the school districts reporting to the Office of Civil Rights in the 1972-73 school year, the report found that they made up 42.3% of the racially identified suspensions.

At the high school level, black students were suspended at more than three times the rate of white students: 12.5% versus 4.1%.

Persistent patterns of suspensions

These inequities in suspensions and removal from school continue to persist.

In recent times, the term “school-to-prison pipeline” is often used to describe systemic practices that ultimately lead students of color into the criminal justice system. These policies often cause the suspension or removal and sometimes the arrest of students from school for nonviolent or minor violations.

Arrested students fall behind the class, thus perpetuating the cycle of poverty.
Meg Stewart, CC BY-SA

The vast majority of suspensions are not for serious or violent offenses. Most are for minor infractions such as tardiness, dress code violations or disruptive behavior.

Why suspension matters

Students who are suspended for substantial periods lose valuable instruction time and fall behind in school.

The unfairness of these practices increases gaps in learning and eventually makes it difficult for black kids to keep up in school. Researchers have found that the use of harsh punishment for minor offenses has a negative impact on children, including increasing the chances of dropping out of school.

The US Department of Education Office of Civil Rights in its 2014 Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC) on discipline provides a stark example of how the educational system continues to fail children of color.

For the 2011-12 school year, for out-of-school suspensions by race/ethnicity and gender, black students on average were suspended or expelled at a rate three times greater than white students.

At the preschool level, although black children represented 18% of enrolled students, they represented 48% of the students suspended more than once.

Although black students represented 16% of the student population, they accounted for 27% of the students who were referred to law enforcement and 31% of the students who were arrested.

Prejudices against students with disabilities

Students of color with disabilities are also disproportionately suspended from school compared to their white counterparts. They are twice as likely to be suspended than their non-disabled peers. And they are referred to law enforcement at greater rates.

Although students in special education represent 12% of enrollment, they constitute one-quarter of students arrested and charged with juvenile offenses.

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) outlines specific protections for parents and their disabled children and requires that school districts provide an appropriate education and services such as counseling, social skills and other supports to meet their unique needs. However, the needs of these children are often not met.

Moreover, there are many protections that apply before a disabled student could be considered for suspension or removal for substantial periods of time. Often, these protections are ignored, and the services that should be provided are not.

Change is needed

Suspension of students for minor infractions is certainly not the solution. We don’t have to look far to see the consequences of policies that take students out of school and place them in vulnerable, nonproductive settings.

The cost – a life of poverty or incarceration – further continues to perpetuate a cycle of failure.

Myriad systems have worked against poor children of color to deprive them of the educational opportunities that their white counterparts have taken for granted. Poverty, violence, inadequate housing and other systemic inequities place these children in a pipeline for failure. Most of us would not be able to endure the burden, if placed in their small shoes.

A great deal of change is needed to combat these pervasive educational inequities. The US Departments Of Education and Justice have begun to take some important steps by issuing guidelines to school districts to reduce the numbers of students who are being removed or suspended from school and encouraging schools to find alternatives to suspensions.

These are important steps, but much work remains to be done.

______The Conversation

Esther Canty-Barnes is Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Education and Health Law Clinic at Rutgers University Newark .

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

Read the original article.

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Matthew Lynch published in Matthew Lynch, Policy & Reform

Future Trends in K-12 Classroom Management and Discipline

K-12 Classroom management and discipline is all about the balance between learning within the classroom and discipline. Today, various trends are currently popular. Strategies that come to mind include Wong’s Pragmatic Classroom, which stresses the need to define expectations for students, and Canter’s Behavior Management Cycle, which emphasizes a distinct discipline model.

So far, though, despite the range of strategies and their fluctuating popularity, all strategies applied to date have their pros and cons, their various strengths and weaknesses.

Above all, there is an increased importance applied to classroom management these days. A relatively new open-mindedness also applies to classroom discipline strategies (the recognition that it is not, after all, better to punish the child for inattention or some indiscretion).

What does this point to? Inevitably, there are several trends to be aware of:

• We are likely to see an increase in success for one strategy or another. Existing strategies for classroom management and discipline approaches tend to be, in general, quite effective. Inevitably, there is also the need to make some allowances for teaching style. Some teachers excel with one approach to classroom management and discipline. Others prefer alternative methods. While this is unlikely to change because it is unlikely that there will be a single strategy deemed more effective than the rest, we can be fairly sure that the handful of top recommended strategies will see an increase. We should see an increase in their strengths and a corresponding reduction in weaknesses as overall efficiency and effectiveness are improved.

• Because of the increased use of technology in the classroom, we can certainly expect to see more of an integration of technology within the classroom, in part as a management approach but perhaps also as a discipline approach. Teachers may well find means of applying technology. Whether it is some sort of integrated system used via a system like the iPad (with more and more public school classrooms enjoying access to this type of technology) or some online database for monitoring student behavior in class will depend on the circumstances. It is likely that teachers will have increased scope to experiment, very likely knowing ten or fifteen years down the line precisely which of these various resource types is likely to be the most effective.

• With a bit of luck, although this trend is less certain, teachers may well also see a greater transfer of learning responsibility to the child. A further advantage of the integration of technology to the classroom is the increase in scope for independent activity among children. In many other areas of school life (for instance, library use and general self-care areas), children are already encouraged to take a lead, to the effect that they learn relevant skills faster and that much more effectively. Very likely, teachers will have means of encouraging students to be more independent in their discipline – in their self-discipline –and, depending on the way in which curriculum and standards develop, perhaps also in terms of how they go about learning within the classroom, moving from task to task and perhaps even having independence in their learning choices.

One thing is for sure though — we can expend change to classroom management and discipline strategies in public education classrooms. We may not have the full story yet on what is likely to happen five to ten years down the road, but we have some signs of change, some definite evidence of the types of shifts. How exactly these individual shifts play out? Only time will tell.

 

 

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