You probably know if you follow me on social, I’m a big time football fan. But basketball, not so much.
Nevertheless, I end up participating in March Madness every year.
There’s a twist. This March Madness isn’t about basketball. It’s about discipline incidents in schools.
You see, Office Discipline Referrals (ODR) tend to increase in the spring, peaking in March. By this time of year, kids and teachers have lost tolerance for each other, and tempers can flare.
Because there are more discipline referrals, that translates into more suspensions, expulsions, and other types of removal from instruction.
Other types of removal from instruction? Yes, that.
Sending a student to the hall
Sending a student to the principal’s office
Sending a student to a time-out room
Sending a student to another teacher’s classroom for a cool-off period
Anytime students aren’t in their classroom, they have been denied access to instruction.
Another variation is also common. I like to refer to it as the “unofficial suspension.” It looks like this…
☎️ Ring! Ring! Hello, Ms. Jones? Rutabaga is having a rough day today. Could you please come pick him up?
If you’ve been called to pick your child up from school due to behavior, that is a suspension and should be documented as such. Special rules kick in with 10 days of suspension to protect the student from further removal from instruction. You need the suspension documentation to make that happen.
If you’d like to learn more about discipline rules that protect students with disabilities, check out this blog post.
The blog post gives you an overview of the rules and procedures. We often field specific and targeted questions about discipline during Office Hours Q&A calls inside Your IEP Source Membership.
This week’s email has highlighted discipline rules. In the coming weeks, we’ll target Functional Behavioral Assessments (FBAs) and Behavior Intervention Plans (BIPs).
If your IEP Bestie’s child is being sent home, share this post with them.