SE Illinois News

Hamilton County Community Unit School District 10 reported 125 suspensions or expulsions for the 2021-22 school year, according to the latest student discipline report by the Illinois State Board of Education.

According to the report, the district expelled or suspended 125 students during the year. This equates to 11 percent of the 1,130 students enrolled.

Students were expelled for four incidents with violence that caused physical injury, seven incidents with violence without physical injury, 26 incidents with alcohol and tobacco, seven incidents with drugs, one incident with a dangerous weapon, other than a firearm.

The district reported that most in-school suspensions were given for unspecified reasons, of which there were 71. There were 25 incidents of tobacco. For 88 incidents, students were suspended for one to two days.

Boy students received 97 suspensions, while 28 girls were suspended.

There were 47 elementary or middle school students, and 78 high school students suspended in 2021-22 school year.

The district reported that most out-of-school suspensions were given for unspecified reasons, of which there were nine. There were five incidents of drug offense. For eight incidents, students were suspended for four to 10 days.

Illinois ranks as the 5th state in terms of the overall number of schools and student enrollment among all states.

Illinois lawmakers enacted laws in 2015 to restrict schools from disciplining a disproportionate number of Black and minority students out of school and into the criminal justice system, often for minor misbehavior.

	In-school Suspension	Out-of-school Suspension
Alcohol	0	0
Violence with injury	2	2
Violence without injury	6	1
Drug offenses	2	5
Firearm	0	0
Other dangerous weapons	1	0
Tobacco	25	1
Other reason	71	9
Total	107	18

	In-school Suspension	Out-of-school Suspension
One day or less	0	0
1-2 days	88	7
2-3 days	13	2
3-4 days	4	1
4-10 days	2	8
More than 10 days	0	0