The initial suspension came during after-school detention, for showing a friend a strange photo of Zainab’s pet rabbit licking a bottle of nonalcoholic champagne. School officials accused her of promoting underage drinking.
The second time Zainab skipped a day without calling the school. The last suspension was for breaking an electric pencil sharpener while sharpening an eraser. She maintained the damage to school property was an accident.
“Before I got suspended, I did a lot better in school. Anytime I’m suspended, I can’t do my work,” says Zainab, who says she feels misunderstood. “I end up getting zeros that whole week, which puts me really down.”
Concern about racial-ethnic disparities in school discipline has long focused on Black boys, who are suspended more often than any other group of students, according to the U.S. Department of Education. But in the last year, more attention has turned to the disparities affecting Zainab and other Black girls, who are the third-most suspended group, after Native American boys.
“I’m excited to see there’s a lot of momentum building around exploring what is happening to Black girls. Historically in this work, Black girls have been the group who have not been covered,” says Thena Robinson-Mock, project director of the Ending the Schoolhouse to Jailhouse Track Campaign at the Advancement Project, a civil rights organization.
The disparities facing girls of color were spotlighted in a report last year from the Office for Civil Rights at the Education Department. In the 2011-12 academic year, 12 percent of Black girls received out-of-school suspensions, a higher rate than any other group of girls. At 7 percent, Native Americans had the second-highest rate among girls. Twenty percent of Black boys were suspended.
