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Students make their way into Ann Arbor Skyline High School on the morning of Wednesday, November 19, 2014. (The Ann Arbor News file)

ANN ARBOR, MI - Low-income and black students are more likely to be suspended at Ann Arbor Public Schools, as the suspension rates for those student groups outpace the general population.

AAPS has seen an overall reduction in the number of students suspended each year from the 2010-11 school year to the 2015-16 school year, although there was a slight increase in high school and middle school suspensions last school year compared to 2013-14.

The board of education reviewed the 2015-16 student conduct report with six years' worth of suspension data at a meeting on Wednesday, March 22.

Overall, 3.4 percent of high school students, 2.4 percent of middle school students and 0.2 percent of elementary school students were suspended at least once in 2015-16. Five years ago, 6 percent of high schoolers, 7.3 percent of middle schoolers and 1.5 percent of elementary school students were suspended at least once.

There's a persistent disparity in how often low-income students, black students, special education students and male students are suspended compared to the rest of the AAPS student population, and those differences are most pronounced at the high school level.

"(Economically disadvantaged students) is the one area where we're not realizing the reductions that we had hoped to see," Superintendent Jeanice Swift, noting that 11.1 percent of low-income high school students were suspended in 2015-16 compared to 1.8 percent of more affluent students.

Low-income students - identified by a form their families fill out to qualify for free or reduced-price school lunches - made up 17 percent of Ann Arbor's high school student population in 2015-16. But 56 percent of the students suspended that school year came from low-income families.

Black students also were suspended at a disproportionately higher rate. About 16.4 percent of Ann Arbor's high school students in 2015-16 were black, and 43.5 percent of high school students suspended that year were black.

High school special education students accounted for almost 29 percent of suspensions and 10.7 percent of the total high school student population. Male students made up 52.5 percent of the high school population and accounted for 71.2 percent of the students suspended.

AAPS is not alone in the pattern of minority and low-income students being suspended at a higher rate than their peers.

Swift also pointed to three emerging trends she sees that will require the school district to offer students even more social-emotional support to curb behavioral issues in the future: an increase in mental health issues that are not being adequately addressed in the community, national rhetoric becoming more negative, and students presenting greater social-emotional needs at a younger age, she said.

"I don't feel this is an honest report unless we point to really those three patterns," Swift said. "That pattern of mental health; that pattern of a desensitization to language, and - particularly in my observation - it's racially-charged language and the incidences are increasing; and then thirdly, those needs that are coming at very young ages."

District administrators gave examples Wednesday of the strategies staff use to address student behavior issues, including restorative justice practices, peer-to-peer mentoring and establishing a common set of expectations in a school and rewarding students who meet those expectations.

Dawn Linden, executive director of elementary education, said the way a teacher responds to a student not following the classroom rules makes a difference in whether that student feels alienated or included in the community, which will affect how that student behaves in the future.

Staff also pointed to the effectiveness of behavioral intervention specialists, who coordinate wraparound services for students who need additional support in order to be successful at school. AAPS plans to add intervention specialists at the elementary level, too.

Board secretary Jeff Gaynor vouched for the value of the intervention specialists he observed in his time as a teacher at Clague Middle School.

"These people work not just with outward behavior problems but with students who have disengaged and suffer academically," he said. "I was just so very impressed with the difference I saw. ... The difference was palpable. I absolutely congratulate the district - all of you - on this program. It's probably the most specific, positive piece that I've seen in a long time."

Trustee Patricia Manley, who tackled student discipline issues as principal of Thurston before retiring in 2011, saw more room for improvement in the suspension numbers.

"This looks really great on paper. It looks like there's a lot of things in place," Manley said. "But it seems like in almost all of the categories for 2015-16, we're seeing a rise. ... If I were a parent or a grandparent and my child was one of the students in this that had one or more suspensions, I would be thinking, 'Well yeah, this looks really great, but it's not working.'"

Administrators said it will require more targeted strategies tailored to individual students to close the disparities in suspensions for different groups of students. Linden and multiple trustees also noted the importance of involving parents in addressing student discipline issues.

Board vice president Susan Baskett said it's important to communicate the school's expectations to parents as well as students, giving the example of a time her parenting style differed from how her son's teacher responded to his behavior.

"We could not have that type of behavior in the neighborhood, but OK if that's what you want in school. I had to - as a parent - decipher that, translate that to my kid," Baskett said. "I know that's not easy, and I had to translate that to the principal, too. So again, keep up the conversation with the parents and the relationships because that's very important."

There's been a statewide effort to reform how schools approach student discipline. Gov. Rick Snyder signed a law in December that gives schools more flexibility in determining on a case-by-case basis whether a student should be expelled or suspended for bringing a weapon to school.