The Biden administration issued new school discipline guidelines Tuesday aimed at cutting back on high rates of suspension and expulsion for students with disabilities by clarifying rules that the nation’s schools are required to follow. https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2022/07/19/school-discipline-special-ed-biden/ Federal officials called the guidance “the most comprehensive ever released” on the civil rights of students with disabilities and said it would help as schools continue to try to rebound from more than two years of pandemic learning.
“This work is especially urgent now, as our schools and our students and families continue to heal from the pandemic,” said Education Secretary Miguel Cardona, pointing out that schools have struggled with learning loss, disruption and a “sharp increase” in mental health challenges. “Exclusionary discipline, such as out-of-school suspensions, can exacerbate these challenges — increasing stress that might lead to a greater sense of social isolation and diminished academic achievement,” he said. EY EY Single Family Office Study Advertisement By EY SFOs are balancing tradition and transformation to manage competing pressures and secure their futures. Learn More The release comes weeks ahead of the 2022-2023 school year and as many schools have cited increased behavioral problems in classrooms last year. According to federal data, students served by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act represented 13 percent of school enrollment across the nation but were handed nearly 25 percent of out-of-school suspensions in 2017-2018, the most recent school year available. The new guidance does not rewrite laws or regulations, but is a small step in the right direction and sends a strong message to schools, said Daniel Losen, director of the Center for Civil Rights Remedies at UCLA. “These kids need a lot of supports, and to fail to acknowledge their needs and suspend them is discriminatory,” he said. Racial disparities in discipline are a continuing issue, federal officials said. Among students with disabilities in middle school and high school, 24 percent of Black students were suspended at least once, compared with 11 percent of White students, according to a report Losen and his colleagues authored. In 134 medium to large school districts, at least 40 percent of Black secondary students with disabilities were suspended at least once, Losen said. EY EY Single Family Office Study Advertisement By EY SFOs are balancing tradition and transformation to manage competing pressures and secure their futures. Learn More In Tuesday’s release, federal officials highlighted instances when discipline goes wrong for students with disabilities. In some cases, that means a suspension or other punishment because of behavior that arises when they are not receiving the services, interventions and other supports that schools are obligated by law to provide. Other times, students may be punished for an offense related to a student’s disability, the documents said. For example, the documents said, a student whose Tourette’s syndrome causes her to sometimes curse involuntarily should not get the usual after-school detention for that infraction. Racial disparities in school discipline are growing, federal data show Students with disabilities can still be disciplined under the guidance. Cardona said it would not compromise the safety or well-being of staffers and other students. He said school leaders should draw on federal funds that they received for pandemic recovery to bolster student supports and increase professional learning for staffers. More than $122 billion has been distributed to school districts so far, he said. EY EY Single Family Office Study Advertisement By EY SFOs are balancing tradition and transformation to manage competing pressures and secure their futures. Learn More More than 8 million children in the United States receive special-education services under the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act — about 13 percent of all children in elementary and secondary schools. Federal officials drew up the first major discipline guidance — affecting all students in the nation’s public schools — in 2014, during the Obama administration. The guidance was scrapped in 2018, during the Trump administration. A year ago, the Biden administration announced it was reviewing the guidance, but it has not yet been released. Max Eden, a research fellow at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, disputed data on the frequency and severity of suspensions for students with disabilities, citing research published in 2019 and a study of teachers’ views in 2019 by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute. Pressuring school districts “will likely yield even more lenient treatment, which may further disrupt and destabilize school environments,” he said. Others said the guidance could been more robust. “This guidance offers some important affirmations of districts’ responsibilities to protect students with disabilities, but it doesn’t go nearly as far as we need the administration to go to protect students against the very real harms of the expanding and evolving school police infrastructure,” said Katherine Dunn, of the Advancement Project National Office, a nonprofit liberal racial justice organization. -- सादर/ Regards अविनाश शाही/ Avinash Shahi सहायक/ Assistant मानव संसाधन प्रबंध विभाग/ Human Resource Management Department भारतीय रिजर्व बैंक/ Reserve Bank of India लखनऊ क्षेत्रीय कार्यालय/Lucknow RO विस्तार/ Extension: 2232 -- Disclaimer: 1. Contents of the mails, factual, or otherwise, reflect the thinking of the person sending the mail and AI in no way relates itself to its veracity; 2. AI cannot be held liable for any commission/omission based on the mails sent through this mailing list.. 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