University Of Delaware: Suspended Justice

Press release from the University of Delaware:

September 2, 2021

Some children are unfairly suspended and expelled from early childhood programs, Prof. Martha Buell says

When you hear about kids getting kicked out of class or school, you likely picture the student who spiked the punch bowl at your senior prom or the bully who spent third period administering wedgies to the debate team.

In other words, you imagine trouble-making teens.

But the apple-cheeked kiddos enrolled in daycare or preschool? Certainly these cherubs are too young to face such severe consequences … right?

Not according to the Center for American Progress. In one analysis, the independent research organization found that, in the United States, 250 preschoolers are suspended or expelled every day. Even more worrisome: Kids from certain demographics — Black students, children with disabilities, English-language learners, larger children and boys — are unfairly targeted. All are subjected to this type of punishment at higher rates than their peers for the same disruptive behaviors. Or, in some cases, for not misbehaving at all.

So reform is needed. But in order to fix policies surrounding exclusionary discipline — that is, any form of discipline in which a child is removed from his or her classmates or educational setting — you first need to know what those policies are.

Enter the latest project of Martha Buell, a professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Sciences at the University of Delaware, with a joint appointment in the Joseph R. Biden Jr. School of Public Policy and Administration. Using a $96,000 federal grant, she is conducting a nationwide census of policy and licensing documentation within the early childhood realm. She and her team, which includes Professors Jason Hustedt and Rena Hallam of the Delaware Institute for Excellence in Early Childhood, housed within UD’s College of Education and Human Development, are analyzing everything 50 states and five U.S. territories have to say about limiting exclusionary discipline — if they are saying anything at all. And they are examining how individual programs interpret these directives. The goal is development of a more streamlined regulatory framework that state and federal administrators can use to improve early childhood care options for families.

“Right now, there is so much variability in this area, each state is like it’s own country,” Buell said. “A little bit of alignment would really help.”

This press release was produced by the University of Delaware. The views expressed here are the author’s own.