Chambana Sun

Black students, constituting 41% or 310 of Jefferson Middle School's total student population of 756, accounted for 36 out of the 54 total suspensions (66.7%) in the 2021-22 school year, averaging roughly one suspension per nine students, according to the latest student discipline report by the Illinois State Board of Education.

During the same period, Jefferson Middle School's 233 white students, who make up 30.8% of the school population, received two suspensions. This translates to an average of roughly one suspension per 117 white students, which is definitively lower than that of Black students, making them the best-behaved racial group in the school.

Of the 54 total suspensions at Jefferson Middle School in the 2021-22 school year, 16 were in-school suspensions and 38 out-of-school suspensions. In addition to suspensions, two students were expelled from the school. In addition to suspensions, two students were expelled from the school. Instead of opting for traditional suspensions or expulsions for some cases, the school administration decided to relocate 106 students to alternative educational settings.

According to the report, in the 2021-22 school year, 26 student suspensions at Jefferson Middle School were for violence-related offenses and four for those including drugs.

The most common infraction causing suspension was violence offenses, tallying 26 cases - 48.1% of the total infractions.

During the 2021-22 school year, Jefferson Middle School reported 156 students - equivalent to 20.6% of its student body - as chronically truant, meaning they had a repeated pattern of unexcused lateness or missing classes. In addition, 271 students, or 35.8% of the student population, fell into the chronically absent category, a broader measure that includes all absences, excused or not.

Black students were notably overrepresented in these statistics, comprising 34.3% of all students who were chronically truant, and 45.2% of the chronically absent.

In a broader context, data from the ProPublica database indicates that Black students are suspended at a rate 4.6 times higher than white students in Illinois—surpassing the already high national average rate of 3.9 times.

However, districts’ officials deny a direct link between these statistics and race. Lisa Small, the Superintendent of District 211, argues that these numbers oversimplify the situation. “Decisions are highly individualized and based on the specific behavior and are not well-suited to a simple numerical analysis,” she wrote in a statement. “They are not a statistic to us, but a developing young adult.”

Illinois ranks 12th in the nation for the highest rate of suspensions among Black students relative to their white peers.

Race	Number of Students	Total Infractions	Infractions Per Student
Hispanic	81	3	0.04
Black	310	36	0.12
Asian	47	2	0.04
Multiracial	85	11	0.13
White	233	2	0.01