Conclusion: Reclaiming School Discipline

  • Judith Kafka
Chapter
Part of the Palgrave Studies in Urban Education book series (PSUE)

Abstract

In the fall of 2009, a six-year-old Cub Scout in Newark, Delaware, brought a camping utensil to school and set off a brief national firestorm when he was suspended for forty-five days because the utensil included a small knife. District administrators said they had no choice in the matter and were following the school system’s zero tolerance discipline policy. After an extended media uproar over the Cub Scout’s punishment, the Christina School District moved to slightly modify its zero tolerance policy so that kindergarten and first-grade children would no longer receive long-term suspensions from school. As some board members conceded, however, the amended policy did not give local educators any greater disciplinary discretion, nor did it protect children in second grade and above from being removed from school for extended periods for similar actions.1

Keywords

Racial Disparity Zero Tolerance School Discipline Tolerance Policy Discipline Policy 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in to check access.

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Notes

  1. 4.
    Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis. Schooling in Capitalist America: Educational Reform and the Contradictions of Economic Life (New York: Basic Books, 1976);Google Scholar
  2. Robert Dreeben. On What is Learned in School (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, 1968);Google Scholar
  3. Michael Katz. Class, Bureaucracy, and Schools: The Lllusion of Educational Change in America (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, Inc., 1971).Google Scholar
  4. 5.
    Children’s Defense Fund. Children Out of School in America (Washington, DC: Washington Research Project, 1974);Google Scholar
  5. Children’s Defense Fund. School Suspensions: Are They Helping Children? (Cambridge, MA: Washington Research Project, 1975).Google Scholar
  6. 6.
    Lawrence Friedman. “Limited Monarchy: The Rise and Fall of Student Rights.” In School Days, Rule Days: The Legalization and Regulation of Education edited by David Kirp and Donald Jensen (Philadelphia: The Falmer Press, 1986), 238–254, 245–246.Google Scholar
  7. 9.
    James Lynch and William Sabol. “Did Getting Tough on Crime Pay? Crime Policy Report No. 1” Urban Lnstitute, published on-line (August 1, 1997), http://www.urban.org/url.cfm?ID=307337, (retrieved May 1, 2011); Heather Ann Thompson. “Why Mass Incarceration Matters; Rethinking Crisis, Decline, and Transformation in Postwar American History.” Journal of American History 97 (December 2010): 703–734, 710.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  8. 10.
    James Guthrie and Matthew Springer. “A Nation at Risk Revisited: Did ‘Wrong’ Reasoning Result in ‘Right’ Results? At What Cost?” Peabody Journal of Education 79 (2004): 7–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  9. 11.
    National Commission on Excellence in Education. A Nation at Risk: The Lmperative for Educational Reform (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Education, 1983); http://www2.ed.gov/pubs/NatAtRisk/recomm.html, (retrieved April 15,2011).Google Scholar
  10. 13.
    Russ Skiba and Reece Peterson. “The Dark Side of Zero Tolerance: Can Punishment Lead to Safe Schools?” Phi Delta Kappan 80 (1999): 372–376, 381–382.Google Scholar
  11. 17.
    Rhonda Brownstein. “Pushed Out.” Education Digest 75 (2010): 23–27, 27.Google Scholar
  12. 18.
    Ronnie Casella. “Zero Tolerance Policy in Schools: Rationale, Consequences, and Alternatives.” Teachers College Record 105 (2003): 872–892;CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  13. Michael Rosenberg and Lori Jackman. “Development, Implementation, and Sustainability of Comprehensive School-Wide Behavior Management Systems.” Intervention in School and Clinic 39 (2003), 10–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  14. Rusell Skiba, et al. “The SRS Safe Schools Survey: A Broader Perspective on School Violence Prevention.” In Handbook of School Violence and School Safety: From Research to Practice edited by Shane Jimerson, et. al. (Mahwah, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2006);Google Scholar
  15. Aaron Thompson and Kristina C. Webber. “Realigning Student and Teacher Perceptions of School Rules: A Behavior Management Strategy for Students with Challenging Behaviors,” Children & Schools 32 (2010): 71–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Copyright information

© Judith Kafka 2011

Authors and Affiliations

  • Judith Kafka

There are no affiliations available

Personalised recommendations