Macon Reporter

Black students, constituting 45.1% or 221 of Stephen Decatur Middle School's total student population of 490, accounted for 245 out of the 405 total suspensions (60.5%) in the 2021-22 school year, averaging roughly 1.1 suspensions per student, according to the latest student discipline report by the Illinois State Board of Education.

During the same period, Stephen Decatur Middle School's 167 white students, who make up 34.1% of the school population, received 91 suspensions. This translates to an average of roughly one suspension per two white students, which is definitively lower than that of Black students, making them the best-behaved racial group in the school.

Of the 405 total suspensions at Stephen Decatur Middle School in the 2021-22 school year, 28 were in-school suspensions and 377 out-of-school suspensions. In addition to suspensions, one student was expelled from the school. In addition to suspensions, one student was expelled from the school.

According to the report, in the 2021-22 school year, 200 student suspensions at Stephen Decatur Middle School were for violence-related offenses and 12 for those including drugs.

The most common infraction causing suspension was violence offenses, tallying 200 cases - 49.4% of the total infractions.

During the 2021-22 school year, Stephen Decatur Middle School reported 320 students - equivalent to 65.3% of its student body - as chronically truant, meaning they had a repeated pattern of unexcused lateness or missing classes. In addition, 333 students, or 67.9% of the student population, fell into the chronically absent category, a broader measure that includes all absences, excused or not.

Black students were notably overrepresented in these statistics, comprising 74.4% of all students who were chronically truant or absent.

In a broader context, data from the ProPublica database indicates that Black students are suspended at a rate 4.6 times higher than white students in Illinois—surpassing the already high national average rate of 3.9 times.

However, districts’ officials deny a direct link between these statistics and race. Lisa Small, the Superintendent of District 211, argues that these numbers oversimplify the situation. “Decisions are highly individualized and based on the specific behavior and are not well-suited to a simple numerical analysis,” she wrote in a statement. “They are not a statistic to us, but a developing young adult.”

Illinois ranks 12th in the nation for the highest rate of suspensions among Black students relative to their white peers.

Race	Number of Students	Total Infractions	Infractions Per Student
Hispanic	19	19	1
Black	221	245	1.11
Multiracial	74	49	0.66
White	167	91	0.54