Suspended in Context: School Discipline, STEM Course-taking, and School Racial Composition

• In Event: 2484 - Section on Sociology of Education Refereed Roundtable Session
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 04. Crime, Deviance, and Education

Abstract

For students, math course taking and experiencing school discipline are key indicators of preparation for career success and involvement in the criminal justice system, respectively. Factoring in racial composition of the school with insights from labelling and life course theories, this study evaluates the simultaneous and exclusive placement into systems which perpetuate early signs of either academic success or school misbehavior and create a barrier for movement between these systems. Bivariate probit analyses of data from the High School Longitudinal Study of 2009 and the Civil Rights Data Collection of 2012 revealed that being suspended prior to high school is associated with being suspended during high school and failing to reach the highest levels of math coursework, while taking algebra 1 or above during 9th grade is associated with reaching higher levels of math coursework and avoiding suspension during high school. School racial context can aggravate the dangers of early suspension and benefits of early math achievement, as previously-suspended students of the racial majority in their school are at particular risk for being suspended during high school and minority students who show early signs of math success are particularly less likely to be suspended in high school. These results confirm the importance for future researchers to evaluate school achievement, discipline, and the context in which they each occur simultaneously.

Author

• Matthew Snidal, Univeristy of Texas