The racial disparities in school-discipline rates are well-known, as are the damaging effects that harsh disciplinary policies can have on school climates.

The winter issue of American Educator explores the history of counterproductive zero-tolerance school discipline policies and highlights more positive approaches to ensure that schools are safe and comfortable places to teach and to learn.

In the state of Iowa the excessive use of suspensions since 2009 has come under much scrutiny. In the last school year, school officials in Iowa suspended students 56,032 times. Though this figure is a reduction from higher numbers in recent times, education advocates see signs of a broken-system.

An overwhelming majority of suspensions were classified as either being caused by disruptive behavior or attendance; 4% of suspensions were the result of ‘fighting without injury’  “By spending time away from the classroom, students are missing out on education and they’re falling behind,” said Nazgol Ghandnoosh, a research analyst for the Sentencing Project, a civil rights advocacy group based in Washington, D.C.

An Investigation by the New York Attorney General’s office found that over a  five year period Albany School District suspended one in eight students each school year, disproportionately affecting minority and disabled students. Attorney General Eric Schneiderman came to an agreement with the Albany School District to ensure that school discipline policies are not discriminatory in nature and practice. A. G. Schneiderman took specific aim at the school-to-prison-pipeline which has obstructed vulnerable children from receiving services they need help to succeed.

The National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, in partnership with OJJDP, has launched the National Resource Center on School-Justice Partnerships. 

A court experiment in Florida attempts to help delinquent girls by promoting rehabilitation rather than incarceration.

The children, an 8-year-old boy and a 9-year-old girl, were so small that the school resource officer, Kenton County Deputy Sheriff Kevin Sumner in Covington, Kentucky, locked the handcuffs around the children's biceps and forced their hands behind their backs, the lawsuit charges. A disturbing video shows the boy, S.R., being shackled and crying out in pain. S.R. has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and a history of trauma. 

Kayleb Moon-Robinson was 11 years old last fall when charges — criminal charges — began piling up at school.

Diagnosed as autistic, Kayleb was being scolded for misbehavior one day and kicked a trash can at Linkhorne Middle School in Lynchburg, Virginia, in the Blue Ridge Mountains. A police officer assigned to the school witnessed the tantrum, and filed a disorderly conduct charge against the sixth grader in juvenile court.

On May 6, Jackson Public Schools seemed to be suffering from a split personality.

As talk of law enforcement reform continues to swirl in the aftermath of the Department of Justice's Ferguson report, some communities have quietly made progress in addressing how police interact with students. Traditionally, police stepped on sch

Police officers in Meridian, Mississippi, were spending so much time hauling handcuffed students from school to the local juvenile jail that they began describing themselves as “just a taxi service.”

We needed to provide more support for students and staff and find a program that offered a long-term solution to address student misbehavior as well as guide future behavior.

Students of color and those with disabilities in San Antonio middle and high schools are disciplined with off-campus suspensions at higher rates than their peers, according to analysis of federal data by the University of California, Los Angeles.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island issued a report calling on state and municipal leaders to examine policies, practices and procedures that lead to discriminatory treatment of black Rhode Islanders, from elementary school through adulthood.

Fairfax County is preparing to dramatically change its approach to dealing with chronically truant students, shifting from a punishment-focused response to one that tries to address truancy as a symptom of a larger problem.