In the education system today, there is a growing problem surrounding the suspension and expulsion rate, especially in high-density socioeconomically disadvantaged areas around the United States. These suspension and expulsion rates then tend to then be related to truancy, and poor performance in school, which then tends to lead to juvenile delinquency. Craig J. Forsyth, Holly Howat, Lai K. Pei, York A. Forsyth, Gary Asmus and Billy R. Stokes conducted a study in Louisiana to investigate patterns in school discipline infractions that lead to suspension and expulsion specifically focusing on the differences between the four racial/ethnic groups. The researchers goals were to answer these five questions. First what is the pattern of suspensions and expulsions among racial/ethnic groups in Louisiana public schools during the 2008–2009 school year? Second, what types of infractions result in suspensions and expulsions in Louisiana public schools during the 2008–2009 school year? Third, What infraction patterns exist among racial/ethnic groups in Louisiana public schools during the 2008–2009 school year? Fourth, what specific infractions tend to result in suspensions and expulsions in Louisiana public schools during the 2008–2009 school year? Lastly, what differences between racial/ethnic groups are noted among the specific infractions that tend to result in suspensions and expulsions in Louisiana public schools during the 2008–2009 school year?

To conduct this research project, they took sample data from all of the K-12 public schools in the Louisiana department of education (excluding private schools) and examined the enrollment and disciplinary rates for the 2008 2009 school year. They distributed this sample by gender and race, the largest groups being the males and the African Americans. According to the Louisiana Department of Education, student discipline infractions are divided into eight categories, which are disobedience, safety, substance abuse, vandalism, theft, violence, truancy and miscellaneous. With these eight categories of discipline they took data from the department education and created 3 additional tables containing the suspension and expulsion rates by race/ethnicity, discipline infraction by race/ethnicity and the specific disciplinary infraction by race and ethnicity. Analyzing the charts, African Americans have the highest suspension/expulsion percentage with a 69% of the total infractions. On the table that breaks down the specific infraction category by race/ethnicity African Americans also have the highest amount of infractions with 229,443 of the 330,210 total infractions by all race/ethnicity’s.

This research project didn’t come to as concrete of a conclusion as I would’ve expected. One conclusion that was drawn from this research though was that African American students had higher rates of disciplinary infractions and or suspensions and expulsions than any other race. But interestingly enough, they claim that “Any analysis, which compares discipline infractions and/or criminal offenses by students of different races/ethnicities should not accept a literal interpretation of the numbers.” Knowing that there are many more factors involved than just the ones represented in the data, tells me that there needs to be more research conducted in order to be able to fully understand this topic and its causes and correlations.

http://www.mdpi.com/2075-471X/2/1/20/htm