African American students have been historically targeted for exclusionary discipline practices and as a result have had severely impacted by the amount of missed instruction. Zero tolerance policies have curated the phenomenon known as the School to Prison Pipeline which has disproportionately criminalized student behaviors and funneled them into…

The use of exclusionary discipline practices in schools has continued to increase since the advent of Zero Tolerance discipline policies in the 1990s. Research indicates that these practices are largely ineffective in addressing behavior, and result in detrimental outcomes for students and communities. This study focused on the use of Disciplinary…

This research study examined the impact of negative behavioral consequences on the academic achievement of 9th-grade students from three rural high schools in South Carolina before and after COVID-19 and by gender. The researcher used a comparative research design to examine achieved data of different genders, incidents at school, actions taken by…

The school-to-prison pipeline has been an ongoing phenomenon for many decades that disproportionately and negatively impacts students of color. Due to research suggesting school principals play a critical role in the student disciplinary decision-making process, the present study aimed to better understand how principals make discipline decisions…

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) mandates that special education students receive free appropriate public education instruction in the least restrictive environment. Special education students often receive a disproportionate number of suspensions in schools. It is the disproportionate number of suspensions received by…

The purpose of this study was to investigate a model of implementing restorative justice practices through understanding our current systems, structures, and resources that positively promote student engagement while mitigating challenging behaviors in middle school classrooms. Cycle 1 data were collected from administrators, support staff, and…

As school systems across the United States seek to address school behavior and examine ways to decrease suspension rates, school administrators face challenges that revolve around maintaining a safe learning environment that fosters a positive school climate while facilitating a balanced approach to discipline and relationship building with…

Exclusionary discipline is used in public schools across the United States. Schools are using suspension and expulsion to punish students for wrongdoing. Removing students from their learning environment has proved detrimental. Moreover, there are racial disparities among the students being subjected to exclusionary discipline. There are…

As school leaders continue to look for solutions to ongoing negative student behaviors, many schools have implemented the Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports framework. The Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports framework supports educators and students using positive strategies for behavior, academic, social, emotional, and…

The disproportionate disciplinary actions imposed on African American male students in the public school system deny them educational instruction time and increased the risk for juvenile delinquency. The purpose of this qualitative interpretive descriptive study was to examine the implementation of discipline practice employed with African…

Purpose: The overall purpose of this journal-ready dissertation was to determine the degree to which economic status was related to the number of days that students were assigned to an exclusionary discipline consequence. In the first study, the effect of economic status (i.e., Not Poor and Poor) on the number of days that Grade 5 and 6 Asian,…

Zero-tolerance discipline policies have been in use in U.S. schools for almost 25 years. Since their enactment in the 1990s, researchers have found that zero tolerance disciplinary policies and practices can cause students to enter the school-to-prison pipeline. The purpose of this qualitative case study was to understand the perceptions of…

The problem of this project study was that middle school teachers in a public school district in southwestern United States did not understand the principals' expectations for implementing the team model and its effect on their relationship with administrators the team model regarding the relationship between administrators and teachers. The…

Exclusionary discipline practices (EDPs) have been linked to poor academic performance and student dropout rates. Research shows that students suspended, expelled, or placed in alternate learning environments fare worse academically than their peers. This qualitative case study explores the experiences of classroom teachers in Northwest Louisiana…

The enactment of Senate Bill 100/Public Act 099-0456 (SB100) in 2016 compelled school districts throughout Illinois to evaluate student discipline policies. This dissertation examines the impact SB100 had on middle and high schools throughout the state and within a large suburban K-12 school district. This dissertation is organized into three…