Oct. 11--School districts in Elgin, Aurora and Naperville have reduced the number of students who are expelled or suspended, adopting an emerging philosophy among educators nationwide that no-tolerance policies often lead to greater trouble for the community as a whole.
"It is counterintuitive" that keeping a misbehaving kid in school may make that school safer, admits John Heiderscheidt, director of safety and school culture for Elgin School District U46. But if a student is suspended from school, he said, the student falls behind on learning. If that leads to dropping out or expulsion, it leaves someone with little education on the street with no job and plenty of free time to interact with kids the same age.
Beginning in 2016, Heiderscheidt said, District U46 will give no students an out-of-school suspension unless they are perceived to be a threat to school safety.
"It's not going to look like traditional discipline did in our day," Heiderscheidt said. "But keeping kids in school lowers the crime rate in your community and keeps them away from pregnancy and drugs and guns."
That new approach doesn't sit well with three parents of bullied children who complained to the District U46 Board of Education after reading about a recent White House conference on the subject attended by a number of Elgin school officials.
Weeping, one father said his son has been urinated on and karate-kicked by bullies. He said the punishments meted out to the perpetrators were "slaps on the wrist."
"My son liked going to South Elgin High School his freshman year. By the time he left, he felt like he was in a prison," the father said. "By not expelling a kid, you may avoid hurting that kid. But you may be allowing him to hurt other kids."
In East Aurora School District 131, Superintendent Michael Popp has focused on reducing the number of expulsions and suspensions since he came to the district about a year and a half ago.
Instead of using the district's old zero-tolerance discipline policies, Popp urges administrators to sit down with students and discuss why they acted in a certain way and how they can make different choices in the future, he said.
Still, East Aurora has set thresholds that, when crossed, will cause a student to be suspended or expelled. For example, a student might be suspended for fighting, and the district has little tolerance for "serious" gang involvement, Popp said.
"Just as young people need to learn about math and reading and science," he said, "young people need to learn about getting along with each other."
When Popp came to the district, he said, administrators often removed students from the building with little exception for offenses such as bringing a weapon to school.
But sometimes, Popp said, the student's weapon was a utility knife left in a backpack after a scouting trip, or a box cutter needed for an after-school job. Instead of enforcing an automatic punishment, Popp advocates working out a solution with the student who needs a box cutter for a job or who accidentally brought a utility knife.
Students would still be punished for dangerous actions, such as bringing a gun or a knife to school with the intent to do harm, he said.
When students are expelled, the district severs all ties with them. The students' parents are responsible for making sure they get educated, and students are more likely to drop out and run afoul of the law, Popp said.
In some communities, parents then can try to enroll their children in private or online schools, Popp said. But for the students without the means to get an alternative education, "you're giving them a sentence that is going to impact them for the rest of their lives," he said.
Last school year, when officials deemed it was necessary to remove students, they placed those students in alternative programs until the end of the year. They eventually expelled three students, at least two of them for gang-related issues.
"Ultimately we're looking for kids to graduate," he said. "And it's hard for them to graduate if they're not in school."
In Naperville School District 203, too, officials say the number of suspensions and expulsions has been going down as a result of a shift from a punitive approach to one focusing on behavior improvement.
Michelle Fregoso, director of communications, said students are suspended or expelled for a range of issues dealing with behavior to substance abuse.
"For several years now the district has made an effort to place students in alternative programs in lieu of expulsion. This has kept kids in school. The school district has made an effort to work on improving behavior instead of focusing on punishment," Fregoso said.
She said personalized programs provide students with an education as well as assistance to help students overcome behavioral issues. That can aid the transition back into school when possible.
"For suspensions, in particular for an alcohol- or drug-related offense, a reduction in suspension is given if a student receives a screening by a licensed professional. The emphasis is on informing and supporting the family for the benefit of the student," she said.
Indian Prairie School District 204 also has been reducing the number of suspensions and expulsions slowly over the past three years. "We always want to reduce the number," said Janet Buglio, executive director of communication services for District 204. "Our focus is on providing an education for our students; that means we want to keep them in school and in a learning environment if possible."
Buglio said the district uses PBIS (Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports) and CHAMPs to curb the variety of behavior issues that can lead to student discipline. In the past three years, District 204, which serves students in portions of Aurora, Naperville, Bolingbrook and Plainfield, nearly cut in half the total number of suspensions across all grade levels.
According to a district Equity Audit Report, 1,631 District 204 students from preschool through grade 12 received in-school or out-of-school suspensions in 2013. That number dropped to 1,071 in 2014 and to 859 in 2015.
In the Elgin-area school district, the new approach doesn't necessarily mean that a kid caught bullying or carrying a knife or using drugs remains in the same classroom, Heiderscheidt says. Usually the alternative to an out-of-school suspension in District U46 is an in-school suspension. And even students who have committed one of the dozen expellable offenses specified in the Illinois School Code -- crimes such as assaulting a school employee or using a weapon -- usually are now sent to an alternative outside school such as the privately owned Ombudsman Educational Services or Summit School for special education students.
The number of expelled students from District U46 dropped from 16 two years ago to just one student last school year. The number of District U46 secondary-school students given out-of-school suspensions has dropped from 7,082 seven years ago to just 2,340 in the 2013-14 school year and 1,827 last school year.
District U46 Assistant Superintendent Ron Raglin says it's more important to attack the cause of the student's bad behavior than it is to punish the child.
"A lot of times misbehavior is a cry for help," Raglin said.
The district also used the PBIS program and offers training to de-escalate conflicts using tactics known as Crisis Prevention and Intervention (CPI).
"We really believe that the best discipline is to teach," Raglin said.
Dave Gathman is a reporter for the Courier-News. Suzanne Baker is a reporter for the Naperville Sun. Sarah Freishtat is a reporter for the Beacon-News.
dgathman@tribpub.com
subaker@tribpub.com
sfreishtat@tribpub.com
