Yesterday I revealed some of the startling results of how school discipline is handled among white, black and Hispanic students. The various studies all concluded that non-white students are more often suspended or turned into the police than their white counterparts.
There are variety of reasons for this situation. Some of it, no doubt, deals with societal norms. After all, just take a look at the incarceration rate of non-whites in prison and jail. This reveals how people of race are treated differently when it comes to punishment for various offenses. No doubt this creeps into our societal fabric of how to treat people in other settings.
The NAACP has concluded, with respect to black male students, that there is a perception that blacks will tend to be very aggressive. The point being that the perception has much to do with how the person handling the school infraction will treat the student.
Other reasons exist for why non-white students are treated differently - more harshly - than white students. Yes, this does point to race...sadly.
I think it would be worth examining just who is handing out these school punishments and consequences. In other words what are the adults doing here? Is this mostly a situation where mostly whites are handing out these punishments or are non-whites just as liable to give severe punishments?
At any rate, this lack of continuity and consistency continues to be problematic and harmful and it adds to the difficulty of educating children.
Dick
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