OCR - DOJ Guidance on School Discipline

The Office for Civil Rights together with the Dept of Justice released a Dear Colleague letter on January 8, 2014 on to help schools administer school discipline without discriminating on the basis of race, color or national origin. The Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC) has found that students from certain racial or ethnic groups are disciplined more often than their peers. The US Dept of Education has a webpage with the letter and a guidance package on school discipline.  The letter also states that although it only addresses race and national origin, “much of the analytical framework laid out in this document also applies to discrimination on other prohibited grounds.” including disability.