Oakland Schools to Phase out Suspensions!
Students who go to public schools in
Oakland, California will no longer have to worry about being suspended if they
demonstrate “willful defiance” in class. Examples of willful defiance include
swearing at teachers, ignoring instructions, and deliberately disobeying school
authorities. Wednesday, the Oakland Unified School District voted to eliminate
suspensions because black students are more likely to be kicked out of school
than whites. Oakland is not the first school district in the country to pursue this
sort of racial justice. In Minneapolis, school administrators must get approval
from the superintendent before suspending students of color. New York City
schools are also looking to cut back on the number of black and Hispanic
students being suspended for various offenses. “We’re getting pushed out of
schools,” one 15-year-old student told the San Francisco Chronicle. Dan’enicole
Williams said that teachers were not willing to understand the reasons behind
classroom disobedience. “They never take time out, if someone is sleeping in
class, to ask what’s wrong. They don’t care about us.” Policies like these come
straight from the Obama administration, where much has been said about the
dangers of zero-tolerance punishments and how they affect minority students. In
a speech last year, Attorney General Eric Holder even went as far as to call
strict disciplinary policies a form of “segregation.”
Oakland, California will no longer have to worry about being suspended if they
demonstrate “willful defiance” in class. Examples of willful defiance include
swearing at teachers, ignoring instructions, and deliberately disobeying school
authorities. Wednesday, the Oakland Unified School District voted to eliminate
suspensions because black students are more likely to be kicked out of school
than whites. Oakland is not the first school district in the country to pursue this
sort of racial justice. In Minneapolis, school administrators must get approval
from the superintendent before suspending students of color. New York City
schools are also looking to cut back on the number of black and Hispanic
students being suspended for various offenses. “We’re getting pushed out of
schools,” one 15-year-old student told the San Francisco Chronicle. Dan’enicole
Williams said that teachers were not willing to understand the reasons behind
classroom disobedience. “They never take time out, if someone is sleeping in
class, to ask what’s wrong. They don’t care about us.” Policies like these come
straight from the Obama administration, where much has been said about the
dangers of zero-tolerance punishments and how they affect minority students. In
a speech last year, Attorney General Eric Holder even went as far as to call
strict disciplinary policies a form of “segregation.”
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NATIONAL ASSOCIATION for the ADVANCEMENT of
WHITE PEOPLE - 2015
WHITE PEOPLE - 2015
