In 2013, the California state legislature took steps to narrow disparities in exclusionary discipline between student groups, especially for students with disabilities and students of color. It amended California’s Education Code to prohibit suspending any student in kindergarten through third grade for willful defiance, defined as students disrupting school activities or defying instructions from school officials through such actions as failing to follow directions or bring materials, wearing banned clothing, or engaging in behavior perceived as disrespectful.

In 2019, the state legislature extended this prohibition to students in fourth through eighth grades and expanded it further in 2023 to include all grades. This strategy aims to reduce the cumulative disadvantage that pushes students—particularly students of color and those with disabilities—out of school in later years, as suspension in early years may lead to a student’s early disengagement from school communities. These policies represent an important shift away from the zero-tolerance policies that proliferated in the 1990s, but analyses on their effects often focus solely on whether the policies reduced suspensions. But how well do these policies accomplish their intended equity aims?

Key Takeaways

Using data on restricted-use enrollment and discipline from the California Department of Education from 2011–12 to 2021–22 for grade levels K–3, the findings show the following:

• Black and American Indian or Alaska Native (AIAN) students were suspended earlier and more often than white, Hispanic, and Asian American and Pacific Islander students. This discrepancy is exacerbated for students with disabilities who have individualized education programs (IEPs), with peak suspension rates occurring for Black students with IEPs in middle school.
• Though suspensions among most racial and ethnic groups declined slightly from 2011–12 onward, the ban’s implementation in 2015 showed little effect. Before the ban implementation, Black and AIAN students experienced a more rapid decline in suspensions and then saw an increase in suspensions immediately following the policy change. Disparities for those with IEPs and for those experiencing socioeconomic disadvantage followed similar trends.
• Suspensions postban declined among K–3 students but not for the entire student population. Upon return to in-person instruction following pandemic-related school closures, suspensions across groups for all grades trended slightly upward. The biggest drops in suspension rates appear to have occurred before policy implementation.
• Although suspensions for defiance declined after the ban’s enactment, stark disparities for Black and AIAN students remained.
• Between grades 4–7, the ban appeared to have reduced long-term suspension trajectories for Black and AIAN students in elementary schools (grades 4–6). But by middle school (grade 7), disparities in suspension remain profound, and rates for these groups dramatically increase and, among AIAN students, surpass the rates of the preban cohort.

Implications

As California moves to implement the next iteration of this policy shift, which will ban willful defiance suspensions for all students, the data highlight the importance of continued monitoring of the policy’s effects. Eliminating suspensions for willful defiance holds promise for keeping students in schools and reducing lost instructional time, but this policy could also be supported through careful investment, provision of counseling staff and mental health services, and strong community partnerships. Though these policies may reduce school-to-prison pipeline trajectories for some students of color, more can be done to address these issues.

Further, it’s important to monitor suspension outcomes by race and ethnicity because there is a lack of transparency around alternative discipline options at the local level. When the bill on K–3 suspensions went into effect in 2015, schools were required to implement alternatives to traditional disciplinary measures that focused on student healing, support, and well-being. But we know little about these alternative paths, and evidence showing that these programs reduce disparities remains limited.

For schools to truly be safe and healthy, these bans can represent an effective first step to negative outcomes that arise from exclusionary discipline, particularly for historically disadvantaged students. But policymakers should stay vigilant to ensure that alternative approaches to discipline are not simply different means with the same ends.

Additional Resources

• Rebuilding the Ladder of Educational Opportunity
• Disproportionality Reduction in Exclusionary School Discipline: A Best-Evidence Synthesis
• The School Discipline Dilemma: A Comprehensive Review of Disparities and Alternative Approaches
• The Color of Discipline: Sources of Racial and Gender Disproportionality in School Punishment
• Understanding the Racial Discipline Gap in Schools
• Understanding a Vicious Cycle: The Relationship between Student Discipline and Student Academic Outcomes
• Do Suspensions Affect Student Outcomes?
• More Than a Metaphor: The Contribution of Exclusionary Discipline to a School-to-Prison Pipeline
• Cumulative Racial and Ethnic Disparities along the School-to-Prison Pipeline
• The Impact of Suspension Reforms on Discipline Outcomes: Evidence from California High Schools
• Multiplying Disadvantages in US High Schools: An Intersectional Analysis of the Interactions among Punishment and Achievement Trajectories
• Rolling Back Zero Tolerance: The Effect of Discipline Policy Reform on Suspension Usage and Student Outcomes
• Is California Doing Enough to Close the School Discipline Gap? Executive Summary
• Are We Closing the School Discipline Gap?
• On Reducing Disparities in Office Discipline Referrals: A Systematic Review of Underlying Theories