Post by Kramer on Sept 10, 2012 13:49:52 GMT -5
Many expelled students carry knives
A quarter of all students expelled from the Springfield School District in the last three years have been caught with knives at school.
A recent review by The State Journal-Register of district expulsion data between 2009 and 2012 also revealed that selling and possessing drugs and violent fights precipitated many expulsions.
Other offenses that resulted in expulsion during the 2011-12 school year included five incidents of students bringing weapons to school, three assaults on school staff members, and one incident each of a student making a “kill list,” creating a homemade explosive, making a bomb threat, starting a fire in a locker room and possessing pepper spray.
A fourth-grader was recommended for expulsion for making “severe threats,” but the Springfield School Board did not approve the recommendation.
No trend
Last school year, the board approved 34 of the 56 expulsions recommended by the district’s student review committee. In the 2010-11 school year, 43 of 55 recommended expulsions were approved. And in the 2009-10 school year, 47 of the 75 recommended expulsions were OK’d.
Board president Susan White said the decrease in the number of approved expulsions last year doesn’t reflect a change in board attitude with the addition of newly elected board members, but the circumstances of each case.
“I don’t really know what or if that decrease means because even though the board makeup has changed, ... each situation is decided on its individual merits,” White said.
Board members Scott McFarland and Bill Looby echoed White’s opinion.
Too strict?
In April 2011, board member Judy Johnson asked the district to re-evaluate its expulsion policy, arguing that the punishments were too strict.
Of the expulsions handed down in the last school year, 17 students were expelled for the rest of the school year (seven of which were after January), 12 were expelled until the end of the next school year, and five were expelled for the remainder of that semester.
In one case, a student was expelled in April — for possessing pepper spray — until the end of this school year.
School Superintendent Walter Milton said no Springfield student has ever been caught using pepper spray as a weapon. Looby said the punishment for carrying pepper spray could use further review.
“I think that’s a legitimate question on whether we should be banning those types of things. But that’s for a lot longer-term discussion. Is it being used as a weapon, and how often it’s happened,” Looby said. “But it’s something that in terms of some student circumstances, (pepper spray) may (make) them feel more secure in their comings and goings from school.”
Zero tolerance
Johnson has repeatedly requested that the district post signs to deter students from bringing weapons to school. Board member Lisa Funderburg said signs in school hallways would probably remind students that there’s a zero-tolerance attitude toward weapons and other threatening offenses.
“Just in my own personal experience as a parent … your child listens as they go through the student handbook, but I think to students it sounds like the “Charlie Brown” cartoon. They aren’t tuning in,” Funderburg said.
No students have been expelled for using knives, so a daily reminder could decrease the number of expulsions, Funderburg said.
Milton said students are often taught about ways to deal with conflicts without employing weapons or unsafe behavior. Also, he noted there are security officers at all middle and high schools in the district.
Alternative option
When a student commits a potentially expellable offense as outlined in the student handbook, school staff members forward the information to a review committee that includes all three high school principals, staff from student services, principals from the district’s three alternative schools and two district administrators.
If the committee recommends expulsion, the case goes to the school board, which has the final say.
Students can be expelled with or without “a program,” which means an expelled student is reassigned to the Lawrence Education Center, Douglas Alternative School or Springfield Learning Academy for classes.
If a student is expelled without a program, he or she still can attend an alternative school hosted by the NAACP.
“Students are expelled from (District) 186 but are still 186 students," said Andre Williams, administrator of the NAACP alternative school. “We have teachers retired from the district, so students have the same curriculum that they had at the regular schools. We give the exact same classes, with the exact same materials.”
***
Expulsions
*2011-12 school year
Lanphier High School (2011-12 enrollment: 1,228) — 9 (13 recommended)
Southeast High School (1,316) — 7 (10 recommended)
Jefferson Middle School (568) — 6 (8 recommended)
Grant Middle School (639) — 3 (6 recommended)
Washington Middle School (553) — 3 (4 recommended)
Springfield High School (1,561) — 2 (5 recommended)
Lawrence Education Center programs — 2 (2 recommended)
Capital College Preparatory Academy (109) — 1 (5 recommended)
Springfield Learning Academy — 1 (1 recommended)
*2010-11 school year
Southeast High School (2010-11 enrollment: 1,296) — 12 (12 recommended)
Lawrence Education Center programs — 8 (9 recommended)
Lanphier High School (1,276) — 5 (6 recommended)
Springfield High School (1,509)— 4 (7 recommended)
Washington Middle School (591) — 4 (5 recommended)
Grant Middle School (680) — 3 (4 recommended)
Franklin Middle School (798) — 2 (4 recommended)
Douglas Alternative School —2 (4 recommended)
Jefferson Middle School (569) — 2 (3 recommended)
Springfield Learning Academy — 1 (1 recommended)
*2009-10 school year
Lanphier High School (Enrollment 2009-10: 1,220) — 13 (19 recommended)
Springfield High School (1,449) — 11 (18 recommended)
Southeast High School (1,296) — 6 (11 recommended)
Lawrence Education Center programs — 5 (8 recommended)
Washington Middle School (560) — 5 (6 recommended)
Jefferson Middle School (532) — 3 (8 recommended)
Grant Middle School (626) — 2 (2 recommended)
Lincoln Magnet School (326) — 2 (3 recommended)