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African-American students suspended more, from pre-school to high school

Posted at 6:57 PM, Mar 21, 2014
and last updated 2014-03-21 18:57:04-04

New information on a story we've been covering for two years.

CBS 6 reported earlier that African-American students are more likely to get an out of school suspension while in middle school and high school. Today we’ve learned the same applies for African American students in pre-school.

This comes from a report released today by the Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights.

It says that about 18% of preschoolers are African-American and that 42% of all preschool students suspended are also African-American.

If you look up the amount of students suspended more than once, that percentage jumps to 48, and indicates that nearly half of all preschoolers suspended twice or more.

You might remember, Henrico Schools came under fire in 2012 after a study said their African American suspension rates were one of the highest in the country.

But the district has been working on that number, and in 2013 that number was dropped from nearly 7,000 suspensions to 5,700.

It's also worth mentioning that earlier this year President Obama’s administration told schools to abandon their intense suspension policies.

We'll let you know when we get any more updates.