DeKalb Times

White students, constituting 41.4% or 206 of Cortland Elementary School's total student population of 497, accounted for 29 out of the 38 total suspensions (76.3%) in the 2021-22 school year, averaging roughly one suspension per seven students, according to the latest student discipline report by the Illinois State Board of Education.

During the same period, Cortland Elementary School's 201 Hispanic students, who make up 40.4% of the school population, received seven suspensions. This translates to an average of roughly one suspension per 29 Hispanic students, which is definitively lower than that of white students, making them the best-behaved racial group in the school.

Of the 38 total suspensions at Cortland Elementary School in the 2021-22 school year, 25 were in-school suspensions and 13 out-of-school suspensions. Instead of opting for traditional suspensions or expulsions for some cases, the school administration decided to relocate one student to alternative educational settings.

During the 2021-22 school year, Cortland Elementary School reported 57 students - equivalent to 11.4% of its student body - as chronically truant, meaning they had a repeated pattern of unexcused lateness or missing classes. In addition, 105 students, or 21.2% 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	201	7	0.03
Black	54	2	0.04
White	206	29	0.14