A recent report found Wisconsin high schools have the highest suspension rates for black students in the nation, which experts link to a lack of proper teacher training and early intervention methods.
Released in late February, the report details discipline rates and the effects on education for schools throughout the nation from 2011-12. The report found suspension rates for black high school students in Wisconsin at 34 percent, compared to white high school students at 4 percent. This 30 percentage point difference adds up to Wisconsin having the highest black-to-white discipline gap in the country.
The report also found Milwaukee high schools suspended more than 43 percent of black students and 16 percent of white students, a decrease from 2008 when the rate was 53 percent for black high school students. To Colleen Capper, a UW professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis, these numbers are shocking, but not surprising.
“This data unfortunately matches all of the racial disparities that occur in the nation,” Capper said. “It shows we have not been responsive to the demographic shifts within the state.”
Capper said Wisconsin has several racial issues to deal with and some are due to school curriculum.
She said the predominately white curriculum taught in schools is not responsive to the needs of students of color and doesn’t fully engage them in the material.
“Historically, when children of color don’t fit their curriculum, they are put in well-intended special programs, but what those kids of color are being told is they aren’t good enough and then trek off into these programs and attract a negative stigma,” Capper said.
Capper said many of these problems can be resolved with a more diverse curriculum and teaching staff, as well as better teacher training and the elimination of the special programs that lower students’ expectations.
Bradley Carl, a UW associate director and researcher at the Value Added Research Center, agrees there would be more progress in decreasing the discipline gap in Wisconsin if teachers were trained to better diagnose signs of troubling behavior and intervene earlier, rather than suspend students later on.
“Suspension data are indicators about how adults respond to behavior in classrooms,” Carl said. “This model of suspending over and over again is just not working.”
Carl advocates for a new program called Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports, which emphasizes earlier behavior intervention in elementary schools and better training for the staff.
He said this program is currently being used in Milwaukee and Madison area schools and has already shown significant decreases in suspension rates over the past few years.
“This program tries to decrease out-of-school suspensions because the longer students are out of school, the farther behind they fall and the higher the suspension rate is, then the more likely they are to drop out in the future,” Carl said.
