Building Better Schools not Prisons: A Review of the Literature Surrounding School Suspension and Expulsion Programs and the Implications of such Programs on the Lives of Racial and Ethnic Minority Students

• Main Author: Johnson, Kwesi
• Other Authors: Olson, Paul
• Language: en_ca
• Published: 2012
• Subjects: Critical Race Theory; disciplinary policies; public schools; socioeconomic disparities; 0340; 0631; 0630
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/1807/33655

It has been argued, albeit with some degree of success, that the challenges facing the 21st century Canadian classroom are highly complex. A troubled economy riddled with cutbacks to the education system, ongoing enrolment decline and challenges in embracing a growth in the diversity of students are among the changes that have made classrooms increasingly difficult to navigate. Though the last assertion may be true, disciplinary policies and the tools used to address unwanted student behaviour have remained relatively unchanged within the education system. Using Critical Race Theory, the author examines the implications of school suspension and expulsion programs on students and provides an analysis of current literature on alternative disciplinary methods in public schools. Findings suggest that a mixture of strategies within various disciplinary programs can benefit some students, but more work must be done to address socioeconomic disparities plaguing the majority of students found in these programs.