DeKalb Times

Black students, constituting 28.8% or 169 of Founders Elementary School's total student population of 586, accounted for 33 out of the 42 total suspensions (78.6%) in the 2021-22 school year, averaging roughly one suspension per five students, according to the latest student discipline report by the Illinois State Board of Education.

During the same period, Founders Elementary School's 233 Hispanic students, who make up 39.8% of the school population, received two suspensions. This translates to an average of roughly one suspension per 117 Hispanic students, which is definitively lower than that of Black students, making them the best-behaved racial group in the school.

Of the 42 total suspensions at Founders Elementary School in the 2021-22 school year, 17 were in-school suspensions and 25 out-of-school suspensions.

During the 2021-22 school year, Founders Elementary School reported 134 students - equivalent to 22.8% of its student body - as chronically truant, meaning they had a repeated pattern of unexcused lateness or missing classes. In addition, 167 students, or 28.5% 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 45.6% of all students who were chronically truant, and 48.8% of the chronically 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	233	2	0.01
Black	169	33	0.2
Multiracial	49	5	0.1
White	134	2	0.01