Practice Profile: School-Based Interventions to Reduce Suspension and Arrest

Evidence Rating for Outcomes

Education | Expulsion/Suspension

Crime & Delinquency | Multiple Crime Offenses

Date: This profile was posted on December 21, 2022

Practice Goals/Practice Theory

School-Based Interventions to Reduce Suspension and Arrest includes different types of school-based interventions that aim to reduce student arrests and suspensions by improving students’ behavior outcomes or improving school climate and reforming school discipline. Research has documented an association between school suspensions and juvenile justice system involvement (Mielke and Farrington 2021). Even temporarily removing a student from school can have lasting effects such that they are less likely to graduate from high school and more likely to become involved with the criminal justice system (Noltemeyer et al. 2015; Peguero and Bracy 2015; Rosenbaum 2018). Rather than relying on the use of suspension, schools may address problem behaviors by using school-based interventions to help students develop prosocial behavior skills. Specifically, these interventions can be 1) targeted by helping students with prior problem behaviors develop social and behavioral skills or 2) universal by improving the overall school environment.

Practice Components

These interventions can be implemented in elementary, middle, or high schools. Universal programs typically involve the entire school or an entire classroom, or they can be implemented as an afterschool program. Targeted programs typically include small group sessions and one-on-one instruction or tutoring. Interventions can address disruptive behaviors by developing social and behavioral skills or by providing psychosocial support. For example, social-emotional learning interventions help students build self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, self-management, and responsible decisions-making (Durlak et al. 2011).

Some examples of specific school-based programs in this practice follow below:

Positive Action is designed to improve youth academics, behavior, and character. The program uses an audience-appropriate, curriculum-based approach to increase positive behaviors and decrease negative ones. The program has been implemented in various settings, including public schools. The program addresses diverse problems, such as substance use, violence-related behavior, disruptive behavior, and bullying, as well as social–emotional learning, positive youth development, character, and academics.
The Rochester Resilience Project is designed to prevent mental health problems and substance abuse by teaching young children social–emotional and behavioral skills. The intervention consists of 14 weekly sessions in which Resilience Mentors teach youth a hierarchically ordered set of skills. The hierarchically ordered skills consists of 1) monitoring of one’s own and others’ emotions, 2) self-control and reducing escalation of emotions, and 3) maintaining control and regaining equilibrium.
School-Wide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (SWPBIS) is a universal, schoolwide prevention program that aims to establish a social culture within schools in which students expect and support appropriate behavior from one another—and thereby create school environments that are socially predictable, consistent, safe, and positive. The primary goals of SWPBIS are to reduce problem behaviors within schools that lead to office discipline referrals and suspensions, and to change perceptions of school safety. The SWPBIS model utilizes behavioral, social learning, and organizational behavioral principles in school settings.

Meta-Analysis Snapshot
	Literature Coverage Dates	Number of Studies	Number of Study Participants
Meta Analysis 1	2008-2019	14	0

Meta Analysis 1

Mielke and Farrington (2021) examined the effects of school-based interventions on reducing youth participants’ rates of suspensions and arrests. They searched the literature for randomized controlled trials published from January 2008 to December 2019. They conducted their searches with databases such as the ERIC and Criminal Justice abstracts databases, specific topical journals, the U.S. Department of Education, and the U.S. Department of Justice’s repositories of evidence-based programs. To be included, a study must have 1) evaluated an intervention that was implemented in a school setting, before, during, or after the regular school day, 2) used an experimental design in which students (or schools) were randomly assigned to either a treatment or a control group, 3) included at least a hundred students at the beginning of the study, 4) been published from 2008 to 2019, and 5) measured the effect of the intervention on an official measure of either arrest or suspension. There were no limits on the type of intervention included, as long as it took place in a school and the evaluation measured either arrest or suspension.

A total of 14 studies were identified, resulting in 12 suspension effects and 6 arrest effects. Thirteen studies were conducted in the United States; one study was conducted in the United Kingdom. Five of the interventions took place in elementary schools, one intervention took place in middle school, four took place in high school, and four took place at multiple school levels. The amount of time students spent in the various interventions differed because of different program formats. The length of time it took to implement interventions ranged from 5 hours to more than 4 school years. Intervention types included cognitive behavioral therapy (four studies), social–emotional learning (four studies), academic supports (three studies), School-Wide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (two studies), restorative practices (one study), an afterschool program (one study), an academic intervention (one study), and a behavioral intervention (one study).

Studies measured suspension as the proportion of students in a school who had been suspended at least once. Suspension data came from official school district records. Studies measured arrest either as the proportion of students who were arrested during a specific time period, or the average total arrests per youth over a certain period. Arrest data came from official records from state police departments, state departments of juvenile justice records, city police departments, or county juvenile parole offices. The study calculated Cohen’s d standardized mean difference effect size using the post-intervention intent-to-treat treatment group and control group means. To account for the heterogeneity of the effect sizes and the varying study sample sizes, the multiplicative variance adjustment was used to weight effect sizes before computing mean effect sizes for the suspension and arrest effects.

Date Created: July 17, 2024

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Practice Snapshot

Age: 5 - 18

Gender: Male, Female

Setting (Delivery): School

Practice Type: Academic Skills Enhancement, Afterschool/Recreation, Classroom Curricula, Cognitive Behavioral Treatment, Conflict Resolution/Interpersonal Skills, School/Classroom Environment, Wraparound/Case Management

Unit of Analysis: Persons

Practice Profile: School-Based Interventions to Reduce Suspension and Arrest

Practice Summary

Practice Description

Practice Goals/Practice Theory

Practice Components

Meta-Analysis Outcomes

Meta-Analysis Methodology

Cost

Evidence-Base (Meta-Analyses Reviewed)

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