Lake County Gazette

White students, constituting 2.7% or 12 of Clearview Elementary School's total student population of 441, accounted for nine out of the 43 total suspensions (20.9%) in the 2021-22 school year, averaging roughly one suspension per student, according to the latest student discipline report by the Illinois State Board of Education.

During the same period, Clearview Elementary School's 367 Hispanic students, who make up 83.2% of the school population, received 27 suspensions. This translates to an average of roughly one suspension per 14 Hispanic students, which is definitively lower than that of white students, making them the best-behaved racial group in the school.

Of the 43 total suspensions at Clearview Elementary School in the 2021-22 school year, 10 were in-school suspensions and 33 out-of-school suspensions.

According to the report, in the 2021-22 school year, 24 student suspensions at Clearview Elementary School were for violence-related offenses.

The most common infraction causing suspension was violence offenses, tallying 24 cases - 55.8% of the total infractions.

During the 2021-22 school year, Clearview Elementary School reported 129 students - equivalent to 29.2% of its student body - as chronically truant, meaning they had a repeated pattern of unexcused lateness or missing classes. In addition, 123 students, or 28% of the student population, fell into the chronically absent category, a broader measure that includes all absences, excused or not.

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	367	27	0.07
Black	48	7	0.15
White	12	9	0.75