The racial disparities in school-discipline rates are well-known, as are the damaging effects that harsh disciplinary policies can have on school climates. Less clear is whether—and if so, how —these tendencies contribute to the race-based achievement gap, a problem so entrenched and pervasive that discussing it is almost clichÉ.
The achievement gap has narrowed since researchers started paying attention to it in the 1960s, but not by much. Myriad factors, many of them out of schools’ control, have stymied efforts to narrow it. Kids of color are less likely to have access to early-childhood education, which puts them at a disadvantage by the time they start kindergarten. They’re more likely to live in poverty and face socioeconomic barriers to success throughout their K-12 trajectories. Their parents tend to have lower educational attainment, meaning they may have less of the social and cultural capital needed to navigate the school system.
[For more of this story, written by Alia Wong, go to http://www.theatlantic.com/edu...dents-behind/460305/]
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