Reason for the research

Discipline has long been an issue on my campus. The biggest complaint teachers have on the campus is that the A.P.’s do not “do enough” when dealing with our frequent flyers to the A.P.’s office. Most teachers want the student excluded from class as a way to control discipline issues in their classrooms. What must be recognized is that even the repeat offenders are entitled to a free, appropriate public education despite their discipline issues. There will be some students who have exhausted all district sanctioned consequences like DAEP or JJAEP. In an effort to shed some light on the subject I have decided to investigate discipline referrals on our campus over two years. I will disaggregate the data based on several factors: race, gender, SES status, educational status, and other issues such as at-risk status or retention. By doing so I hope to isolate a group or groups who tend to have the most infractions leading to exclusion thereby giving the campus an idea of who to target for early intervention or character education. Although it is not politic to just isolate one group of students who might have discipline issues we may be able to use various interventions through the A.P. or counseling office to head off discipline issues before they lead to exclusion. It is my intention to share my findings with the campus administration and, if approval is given, with the campus staff. My hope is that we will adopt a character education program for the campus to better control discipline before a referral is written. Teaching our students is not just about books and papers but also citizenship.