Quantcast
Advertisement

Morris: Norwalk school suspensions have dropped, not doubled

June 19, 2015
–
Nancy Guenther Chapman
Adamowski 088
Norwalk high school students with the Youth Council of Justice, a program of Serving All Vessels Equally (SAVE), stage a demonstration Tuesday in front of City Hall.

NORWALK, Conn. – School suspensions aren’t up; they are down, Norwalk Public Schools Human Relations Officer Bruce Morris said.

On Tuesday, teenagers in the Youth Council of Justice, a program of Serving All Vessels Equally (SAVE), held a vigil in front of City Hall as West Rocks Middle School held a promotion ceremony inside. They alleged that school suspensions in Norwalk had risen dramatically in 2013 and said their classmates had been pushed out by zero tolerance discipline policies, a school-to-prison pipeline.

The students were using statistics from Connecticut Voices, Morris said Thursday. Connecticut Voices used “unique students” in its statistics and did not refer to any other information, he said.

The actual suspension rates, if you look at the total number of suspensions, are down, he said.

The total number of out-of-school suspensions was 541 in 2011 and 548 in 2013, he said. The “more important number” is the total suspensions, including in-school suspensions, he said, which, in 2010-11, was about 2,358; in 2013 it was 1,855.

This is due to a legal mandate to have more suspensions take place in school. The numbers were much higher before 2010-11, he said.

Next year, elementary schools will be included in the new approach, he said, citing “phenomenal results.”

The most dramatic results are at the middle school level, he said: In 2011 there were 463 suspensions at West Rocks Middle School, and in 2013 there were 231 suspensions. At Ponus Ridge Middle School, there were 378 suspensions in 2011 and, in 2013, there were 102.

The numbers for this year will be compiled next week and a report will be released, he said.

“The issue around suspension and even pushouts is the excessive use of suspensions, and more importantly, for the same students,” Morris said. “When you have multiple suspensions, six-seven-eight suspensions, that is a student who is likely to be pushed out. That is a student who is falling behind. By reducing the overall number you are benefiting those students and benefitting the school climate.”

More Stories

Comments

11 responses to “Morris: Norwalk school suspensions have dropped, not doubled”

  1. Lifelong Teacher

    Before another mandate is shoved down on elementary schools, perhaps Mr. Morris in his infinite wisdom will provide the personnel to staff in school suspension. At the moment, there is no one.

    Or better yet, perhaps central office and the board of education will provide elementary schools behavioral interventionists, sufficient social workers, or psychologists who would (gasp) actually counsel children! We have none of this now.

    And for those students who are “pushed out,” perhaps they should refrain from assaulting other children, threatening the lives of their classmates and teachers, throwing furniture, bringing weapons and drugs to school, and generally destroying the learning environment for everyone else. Those are the types of behaviors that lead to suspension.

  2. Mrs. Ruby McPherson

    Challenging behaviors, no matter who they are, but mentally, drug abuse or physical abuse, bring in Psychologists, sufficient social worker, wouldn’t that be apart of the school budget (BOE) ?

  3. Non partisan

    Is it possible to hold parents accountable for the actions of their children?

  4. Lifelong Teacher

    Sometimes suspension will inconvenience them, and perhaps alert them that there is a problem.

  5. Marie Avila

    In all my years, suspension rarely taught parents anything. they’d usually switch to an in-school suspension to accommodate the parents, and all that did was load down an administrator with a sulky kid for the day and get the kid out of class. Occasionally you’d have a decent kid from a decent family who just made a one-time mistep and everyone WOULD learn. That was a rarity.
    Bruce M. is a joke – all he wants to do is call the schools and ask why their suspensions are so loaded with minority kids instead of the addressing the heart of the problem, which is why are most of the suspendable acts are committed by minority students. He just wants an opportunity to accuse people of racism.

  6. Lifelong Teacher

    Thank you. Well said.

  7. EveT

    No wonder suspensions are ineffective, if it’s true that there’s no intervention staff to counsel the kids who misbehave in ways that endanger others. Not to mention their parents. It’s easy to understand parents getting defensive and insisting that their kid is just being “picked on.”

  8. Charles the Hammer

    No disciplinary method ALWAYS works. When suspension is properly applied, it can help the suspended. However, it is important to remember that it also is a benefit to those students remaining in regular classroom settings because it improves the learning environment when distruptive students are removed and corrected.

  9. Kathleen Montgomery

    I was a member of a committee in a middle school in PA made up of the sheriff, parents, teachers, administrators and key members of the city government. After hearing all the concerns from these individuals, we decided to bus suspended students to areas in the city that needed work…parks, cleaning sidewalks, etc. Each person supervising students was charged with connecting with the students and their families. Counselors followed up at school with the students and ,when required, social workers followed up with parents. The outcome was suspensions dramatically decreased and (the larger outcome) was that students who were chronic “troublemakers” became much more responsible.

    Takes a community.

  10. fedUP

    this vigil is embarrassing and makes me ashamed to be a resident of this city…I guess thats why many are moving away.

  11. fedUP

    takes a FAMILY

Leave a Reply

Newsletter

Secret Link