Chief Education Officer Jason Helfer (2023) | Illinois State Board of education
Chief Education Officer Jason Helfer (2023) | Illinois State Board of education
During the same period, Harrisburg Middle School's 290 white students, who make up 83.3% of the school population, received 50 suspensions. This translates to an average of roughly one suspension per six white students, which is definitively lower than that of multiracial students, making them the best-behaved racial group in the school.
Of the 66 total suspensions at Harrisburg Middle School in the 2021-22 school year, all of them were out-of-school suspensions. In addition to suspensions, four students were expelled from the school. In addition to suspensions, four students were expelled from the school. Instead of opting for traditional suspensions or expulsions for some cases, the school administration decided to relocate one student to alternative educational settings.
According to the report, in the 2021-22 school year, 29 student suspensions at Harrisburg Middle School were for violence-related offenses and for an offense including drugs.
The most common infraction causing suspension was violence offenses, tallying 29 cases - 43.9% of the total infractions.
In addition, 101 students, or 29% of the student population, fell into the chronically absent category, a broader measure that includes all absences, excused or not.
Multiracial students were notably overrepresented in these statistics, comprising 51.4% of all students who were 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 | 11 | 3 | 0.27 |
| Multiracial | 36 | 11 | 0.31 |
| White | 290 | 50 | 0.17 |
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