Examining Exclusionary Discipline Practices: Utilizing Response to Instruction and Intervention for Behavior as an Innovation for Change in Attendance and Suspension Rates within Three Rural Elementary Schools in Tennessee

Abstract

Widespread school discipline problems came to forefront in the educational arena in the 1990s (lm & Vuran, 2016). Exclusionary practices (e.g., in- or out-of-school suspension, strict rules, or punishment [Skiba & Peterson, 2000]), also known as traditional school discipline practices (TSDP) (Scheuermann & Hall, 2011) have become common behavioral practices across the American public education landscape (U.S. Department of Education, 2016). These practices remove students from instruction, often resulting in detrimental impacts to student performance (Edward & Brea, 2016), and have neither positive effects on student behavior (Ogulmus & Vuran, 2016) nor positive longevity effects (Costenbader & Markson, 1998).In support of federal legislation aimed at retention of students in the school environment (U.S. Department of Justice, 2011), Positive Behavior Interventions and Support (PBIS) (used interchangeably with School Wide Positive Behavior Interventions and Support [SWPBIS]), focuses on improving the school climate. The PBIS-tiered behavior system in Tennessee, Response to Instruction and Intervention for Behavior (RTI2-B), was created to increase prosocial behaviors and decrease problem behaviors. Although PBIS has been well studied throughout the literature, there has been a paucity of formal research conducted on this tiered behavior system.The purpose of this quantitative study was to determine if the RTI2-B program created statistically significant differences in attendance and suspension rates of students by grade and race at three rural Tennessee elementary schools, using archived student data from a small rural school district in western Tennessee. A paired samples t test was conducted to compare suspension rates before and after program implementation, and another paired samples t test was used to analyze school-wide attendance patterns before and after program implementation. Bivariate analysis was used to examine post-intervention suspension differences by race. The relationships between pre- and post-intervention attendance data by year, pre- and post-suspension data by grade across years, and post-intervention differences in race were also analyzed