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School Suspension Definition

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The authors address a significant gap in the literature on school punishment by being the first to examine the cumulative effect of school suspension on future contact with the criminal justice system. Using longitudinal hierarchical generalized linear models, the authors discovered two important findings: 1) youth who receive school suspension have an increased likelihood of experiencing arrest over time, and 2) youth who are suspended are more likely to be arrested than their non-suspended counterparts. From a theoretical standpoint, the authors conclude that school suspension may serve as a negative turning point within the life history of youth who are affected, thus fitting in with the life-course perspective. School suspension is also …show more content…

While they initially found that race significantly predicted the likelihood of arrest over time, they later found that race became no longer significant when school suspension was accounted. The authors admit that this result was unanticipated and suggest that the effect of school discipline on future arrest may traverse race-ethnicity, however their discussion does not go much beyond this statement (p. 20). Since their study is “the first to demonstrate the cumulative effect of school suspension on formal sanctions within the criminal justice system,” they present a finding that not only extends the literature in a consequential way, but also has important implications (p. 19). Therefore, a deeper and more thorough discussion of this finding seems …show more content…

In underscoring the need for research which examines school discipline as a potential negative turning point within the context of an increasingly punitive society, they establish the overall importance of their research.
Coherence and Coverage of the Literature
5 The literature review is concise and artfully describes life-course perspective’s intersection with labeling theory and how this theoretical framework is suitable for examining the impact of school disciplinary actions. Overall, their coverage of the literature was well-executed and illustrative of the significant gap concerning the effects of school discipline over the life course.
Theoretical Contribution
5 The authors detail the tendency of life-course researchers to focus on desistance from criminal conduct by way of positive turning points (e.g., marriage and employment), while neglecting negative turning points, such as school discipline, which provoke criminal sanctions (p.4). In filling this gap, they offer a meaningful contribution to the life-course literature and illustrate the use of this perspective within a non-traditional

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