APS taps 12 middle schools for program to reduce suspensions

Albuquerque Public Schools has announced the dozen middle schools that will participate in a $4.3 million program to reduce suspensions among minority and special education students.

The Restorative Justice initiative — funded by the U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Education — will launch at six schools during the 2018-2019 academic year, the other six in 2020.

Jefferson, Kennedy, George I. Sanchez, Truman, Ernie Pyle and Taylor middle schools are in the first round. Grant, Hayes, Jackson, Polk, Washington and Tony Hillerman middle schools are in the second round.

This spring, the district’s 27 middle schools were invited to fill out an application to join the program, which focuses on mediation and reparations to rebuild community after an offense. Twelve schools applied and all were accepted.

Restorative justice — a philosophy that has been gaining popularity in many large urban areas — particularly targets minority children, who are disproportionately impacted by “exclusionary discipline” such as suspensions and expulsions and can fall behind in class as a result.

“We want to move from punitive to positive,” Kristine Meurer, executive director for the APS Student Family and Community Supports Division, said during a board committee meeting last week “It’s a different type of mindset. It doesn’t happen overnight.”

The Restorative Justice program will offer a number of new approaches, including:

Community Group Conferences: offenders and victims, support advocates, parents, community members and a trained facilitator discuss the incident, harms caused, and reparative actions.

Restorative Agreement Meeting: conflicting parties make written agreements about how to improve their relationships and achieve desired outcomes.

APS is partnering with the Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, an independent, nonprofit organization, to administer the grant, which funds training, stipends for school staff and other costs.

The program’s progress will be evaluated through focus groups, surveys and school discipline data.

Currently, APS is largely in line with national trends on suspension rates.

An APS analysis of 90,000 school records from 2010 to 2015 showed that Hispanic kids accounted for 74 percent of all suspensions, though they only made up 67 percent of the enrollment. African-Americans were a very small population — 2 percent of the district — but represented 4 percent of suspensions.

In contrast, Caucasians made up 21 percent of the student body and only 14 percent of suspensions.

Along with ethnic minorities, special education students were also prominent, suspended at twice the rate of their enrollment in the school population.

Most of the suspensions were for nonviolent infractions like disruptive behavior.

Lorenzo Garcia, APS board vice president, said the data is “alarming.”

He and the rest of the board expressed support for the Restorative Justice program.