Alder Dean Dr. Nate Monley presented his dissertation research at the 2018 American Educational Research Association (AERA) Annual Conference in New York City in April. Monley presented his paper “Charter Schools That Do Not Suspend” as part of the roundtable session “Safety and Discipline in School Choice Contexts.” The roundtable was held by the Charters & School Choice Special Interest Group (SIG) of AERA. The aim of this SIG is to “provide a non-partisan, multidisciplinary forum for research and discussion about various forms of school choice that empower parents with the decision of where to send their children to school.”

In his presented paper, Monley writes:

Charter schools attempt to write a new narrative in how America serves its children in public schools. While some charter schools in urban areas serving low-income students of color have shown promising routes to academic achievement, in some cases they have not confronted the inequitable patterns of discipline they perpetuate. In this project, I explore two small urban charter schools that are academically successful and do not suspend or expel their students, specifically their African-American and Latino male students. I filter this exploration through my own perspective as the former principal of a small urban charter school like the ones I study in this project. I synthesize a protective resilience frame with an organizational framework used to examine districts in order to organize and frame findings. Ultimately, this project and its findings should be useful for teachers and leaders in small urban charter schools seeking to organize in such a way as to limit exclusionary discipline.