Celebrate all the students who aren’t expelled

If I understand your Sunday report, “SC’s black students disciplined more often,” in the 2014-2015 school year, 126,187 Midlands students dragged themselves out of bed and headed to school every day, for 180 days. From the inner-city, from farms, from affluent neighborhoods, they came; some were homeless. The best and brightest, those with physical and mental problems, many medicated, they trekked to school on foot, by bus, in luxury SUVs. They came fueled by home-cooked breakfasts, McMuffins and Mountain Dew or the free breakfast in the school cafeteria.

They watched classmates’ misbehave, “very punitive measures” and “frivolous stuff, playing pranks and those kinds of things that cause children to be suspended and expelled.” They were exposed to peer pressure to use alcohol and drugs. Some saw guns, knives and phones in the classroom. Some were bullied or sexually harassed.

Some were motivated and learned. Some were bored but persevered. But 115,188 avoided suspension (91 percent), and 125,867 (99.7 percent) avoided expulsion. Congratulations to those students for following the rules and giving themselves and their classmates a chance to learn. Thanks to their parents, grandparents, aunties, uncles, Sunday school teachers, pastors and mentors for instilling values and character. Thanks to teachers for caring enough about students to be understanding, tolerant and fair. Thanks to administrators for using expulsion as a last resort: 126,187 students, for 180 days, and only 320 were expelled.

I hope the parents of the suspended or expelled (my guess is that some were repeat offenders and not separate children) will work with teachers, administrators, counselors and school psychologists to get to the root of the problem so their children and other children can learn and be productive members of the school community and society.

To anyone who would place a ceiling on a child’s ability to learn or behave by using race or class as a crutch to excuse bad behavior, I say, “Shame on you!” Dr. Martin Luther King’s quote still rings true: “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”

This story was originally published April 19, 2016 at 1:21 PM with the headline "Celebrate all the students who aren’t expelled."