New California Law Supported by ADL Keeps Students in School

  • October 1, 2014

California has once again shown itself to be a leader in promoting civil rights and equality for all by banning school suspensions for K-3rd grade students and expulsions for all students under the subjective and often-abused “willful defiance” standard in the Education Code.  As part of our mission to fight bigotry of all kinds, ADL has had a long history of supporting equal access to quality education for all students—the goal promised in the landmark Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court ruling in 1954.  This momentous change in California law, which ADL proudly supported, will bring us a significant step closer to that ideal.

In pertinent part, the new law specifies that a public school student in grades 6-12 may be suspended for willful defiance—which can be as minor as a dress code violation or failure to hand in homework—only after the third offense in a school year and provided that other means of resolving the behavioral problems were first attempted.   The law also prohibits a school from recommending that student for expulsion solely for willful defiance.  The law now encourages schools to invest in children rather than resorting to harsh out-of-school discipline for relatively minor offenses.  Its passage will ensure that students remain where they need to be—in class—and not on the streets or in the criminal justice system.

Although there are many fac­tors that con­tribute to a student’s inability to thrive in school, the cycle of sus­pen­sions and expul­sions is among the best indi­ca­tors of which stu­dents will drop out.  Stu­dents who drop out of school have more dif­fi­culty find­ing gain­ful employ­ment, have much lower earn­ing power when they are employed, and ulti­mately are more likely to become involved with the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem.  This troubling phenomenon—which dis­pro­por­tion­ately impact stu­dents of color, stu­dents with dis­abil­i­ties, and stu­dents who iden­tify as les­bian, gay, bisex­ual or trans­gen­der—has become known as the “school-to-prison pipeline.”  Working to dismantle the pipeline has become a key focus of ADL’s civil rights and education agendas.

Both the Los Angeles Unified School District and the San Francisco Unified School District have already completely banned suspensions and expulsions for willful defiance, taking a significant step towards dismantling the shameful school-to-prison pipeline.  California’s new statewide law will sunset in three and a half years.  During this time, ADL will be working with coalition partners on new bills and initiatives to strengthen protections for students and develop additional alternative methods for changing negative student behaviors with positive interventions.