This reports sounds horrible but it lacks a lot if information to put what is here in any context. What were the suspensions for? What other factors are involved such as socioeconomic? Parents who don't have to work two jobs have more time to spend with the kids and get more involved in their education? Are all the kids being reviewed have English as their primary language? It is likely kids who come to school and have to learn English on top of everything else are going to fall behind at least initially. With out this information to start to define the reason for the numbers above how do you start to address it?

"What were the suspensions for? "

What do you think? Oh, yeah: "black students were over 15 times as likely to be suspended as white students"

"Just a statistical blip due to socioeconomic differences."

Pure privilege, that statement. Don't utter that in front of your black friend.

While Menlo Park City School District was not the main focus of this article, we would like to address the brief reference to racial disparity in our district. We take the issue of equity seriously and have been working over the past several years to address the disparity in our suspension rates that existed in years past. What's newsworthy is that with an earnest focus on restorative practices and efforts to support and help students with behavioral issues, we have turned the corner on our suspension rates, drastically decreasing overall suspensions from more than 120 per year six years ago to fewer than 10 per year currently. We urge readers to be careful in making assumptions about broader trends based on statistics of such low numbers. The story of racial disparity in discipline in public schools is a real concern across the country, and MPCSD is proud to be one district that has had success in reversing a concerning trend. It is, however, challenging to adequately tell this story with data alone, in a district such as ours with statistically very low rates of non-white students. The data in this report suggests that 2 African American students were suspended and 4 white students were suspended, which because of the much higher enrollment of white students, does account for the difference in rate based on race. Those interested in the important story about how we addressed racial disparity and worked to build a culture of respect and very little discipline issues may reach out at info@mpcsd.org.