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Restorative for All? Racial Disproportionality and School Discipline Under Restorative Justice

Description

Abstract:
The well-documented racial disparities in school discipline have led many school districts in the U.S. to adopt restorative justice practices. The restorative justice philosophy differs from traditional disciplinary action by placing an emphasis on restitution and improving behavior rather than punishment. While models of restorative justice are descriptively and theoretically promising, research on restorative practices in schools is limited. We use student-level administrative data and a difference-in-difference design to measure the changes in student discipline outcomes that occurred under restorative justice in Pacific City schools between the 2008-2017 school years. Results indicate that restorative justice practices led to an overall reduction in disciplinary action. However, results also show that restorative justice practices had differential effects between racial groups, with White students benefiting most from restorative justice. These findings suggest that while the overall effects of restorative justice are promising, these practices may unintentionally widen the racial disproportionality in school discipline they are instituted to mitigate.

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Use and Reproduction
In Copyright

Citation

Miles Davison, Andrew M. Penner, and Emily Penner, "Restorative for All? Racial Disproportionality and School Discipline Under Restorative Justice" (2019). EdWorkingPapers.com Archive. Brown Digital Repository. Brown University Library. https://repository.library.brown.edu/studio/item/bdr:956631/

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Collection:

  • EdWorkingPapers.com Archive

    The Annenberg Institute at Brown University has developed this national working paper series to provide public access to high-quality papers from multiple disciplines on a wide variety of topics related to education. EdWorkingPapers focuses particularly on research with strong implications …
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