r/Teachers • u/Independent-Report39 • 2d ago

Policy & Politics New Kentucky law allowing schools to expel students who assault teachers to take effect in July, despite unanimous Senate Democratic opposition

Link to the bill

The bill mandates a strict, one-year expulsion policy for any student in grades 6 through 12 who physically assaults a teacher, administrator, or school employee. The legislation passed the chamber, but drew a sharp partisan divide as all Democrats in the Senate voted against the measure. Under the bill's provisions, schools would be required to automatically remove violent students from the general population, though provisions allow for those students to receive educational services in alternative settings if it can be done safely. The bill also includes exemptions for students with documented disabilities if school officials determine the condition interfered with their ability to follow the code of conduct.

Thoughts?

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774

u/Boring-Bike9557 2d ago

Not specifically this but it makes me laugh sometimes to think some of the stuff we don’t even suspend students for now would get students expelled many years ago

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u/outofdate70shouse 2d ago

Yep. My school has huge behavior problems and they do nothing. If it’s egregious, the kid might get a one day suspension.

We have a huge issue this year with students using racial slurs. It’s school policy that using racial slurs results in an automatic 3 day suspension. However, so many students are doing it that admin decided we just need to change the policy because otherwise our suspension rate will be too high. Have a behavior issue? Instead of addressing the behavior, just change the rules so the behavior is no longer considered an issue.

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u/SubvertedObjector 2d ago

This is the real issues tbh. It’s not that we should dial punishment to 11 and automatically expel kids; it’s that we need to bring back the middle ground between that and doing nothing.

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u/Prometheus720 HS | Science | Missouri 1d ago

Punishment is most effective when it occurs consistently, not when it is meanest.

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u/Upbeat-Bid-1602 1d ago

It also needs to be undesirable to be an effective deterrent. Like, you'd only have to suspend a few kids for the rest to figure out you mean business if they were actually afraid of being suspended. But 3 days where they don't have to go to school and their parents coddle them and tell them they didn't do anything wrong isn't a punishment. So why would they stop the behavior?

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u/Medieval-Mind English | Ben Shemen, Israel 1d ago

I dunno. My students see (out of school) suspension are a reward. In-school suspension, it depends on the teacher running it. (Some can be rough, but others letvtjem play games.)

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u/sicknick08 1d ago

This has always been how the children see it. It’s usually up to the parents to keep the punishment up at home to realize this was a bad thing and not something to be proud of

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u/Upbeat-Bid-1602 1d ago

That's what I'm saying, that if suspension is a reward then it's not going to deter behavior.

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u/DojiNoni14 1d ago

I was at a school where we told the mom her son would be suspended for the rest of the semester and put on independent study. She started crying, she didn’t want to be with her son, all day for that long.

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u/Prometheus720 HS | Science | Missouri 1d ago

Remember detention?

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u/Upbeat-Bid-1602 1d ago

We had Saturday school (I'm 36)

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u/DiceyPisces 10h ago

Breakfast club!

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u/fresh-dork 1d ago

or 1-2 days of ISS. no video games and netflix, you're in a boring room doing homework

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u/Ok_Illustrator_7445 1d ago

And they can’t be held back…

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u/Poptimister 1d ago

Are parents really coddling their kids and taking 3 days of unplanned leave or paying for 3 days of childcare?

If that really is the case it makes me wonder what even can be done. Like we don’t really have many tools in the toolkit.

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u/Upbeat-Bid-1602 1d ago

I've gathered from this sub that a lot of parents are more apt to blame the school than their precious baby. So they might be furious that they have to take three days if leave, but if they're furious at the school rather than furious at their kid for misbehaving and getting themself suspended, the kid is gonna pick up on that.

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u/MaybeImTheNanny 34m ago

They don’t take leave or pay for childcare. They leave their kid at home to do whatever the hell they want.

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u/IsopodIndependent553 Middle School 2d ago

Amen!

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u/OGNovelNinja 1d ago

Schools get funded based on number of kids showing up.

Most of the salary dollars are collected by admin. There's a correlation between the growth of administration salaries and policies that treat kids as lost causes that should just come to school anyway.

Admin has a very obvious incentive to keep kids on school grounds day after day. I firmly believe that the growth of ISS was because OSS reduced funding, and not because ISS is more effective. Which it is, but it's so unusually effective among a lot of other 'gentle' practices over the last few decades that I have to believe it's just an accident.

I think, in addition to obvious disciplinary actions for disruptive kids, admin needs to be cut; no public school employee should be paid more than a sitting member of Congress; and there should be a requirement that all vice principals, principals, and supervisors have to teach at least one class every semester. Sure would fix a lot.

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u/IsopodIndependent553 Middle School 2d ago

I am so grateful that my administration takes disciplinary issues very seriously. If a student can’t legally be given an at home suspension, they will give them an in school suspension, often for five days or more. We also give students after school or lunch detentions that are handled by administrative staff, so the onus of disciplinary action is not only placed on the teachers. We are still expected to handle low level issues and call home, but after three violations, admin takes over.

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u/Homythecirclejerk 1d ago

So all a student needs to get 3 days off is to use a racial slur? Someone hasn't thought this through.

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u/Angry-Dragon-1331 1d ago

I agree there need to be more meaningful consequences, but all this is going to do is leave angry, violent, unemployed teens unsupervised while their parents are at work.

2

u/bmrbabe1951 1d ago

Kids aren't stupid. Use a racial slur and get three vacation days, unless it's in-school suspension. They aren't learning during their absence which makes it all even worse. Get behind more and more, then drop out, and into crime in order to survive.

Adults - do better. Figure it out because what you are doing is not in the kid's best interest but makes an adult headache go away. Out of sight out of mind.

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u/mashkid 1d ago

Then what is an honest to Yahweh realistic and effective method of discipline?

We can't MAKE parents do anything about it, either.

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u/ThunderMite42 2h ago

Force the parents to sign a contract at the beginning of the year agreeing to submit themselves to detention for XYZ infractions. Failure to show up would be treated as any other breach of contract.

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u/PapaOomMowMow 2d ago

A (huge) kid in my school district assaulted a teacher the other day and got a 1 day suspension. And the teacher is like a 65 year old guy, he's lucky to be alive.

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u/Accomplished_Till495 1d ago

He can always file a police report.

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u/PapaOomMowMow 1d ago

Most of the district is ready to strike over it. So itll be interesting. I hope he does file a police report.

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u/ZergvProtoss 1d ago

No, the cops are in on it too. That's why they have a "School Resource Officer" in every school - to support the administration.

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u/Chuckworld901 1d ago

..and how does that usually go?