Excluded and Erased: The Conspicuous Absence of Native Children in Research on School Discipline Disparities

ABSTRACT

Despite extensive scholarly and policy attention to the phenomenon of racially disparate school discipline, its negative effect on academic achievement, and its relationship to later criminal system involvement and incarceration, little has been written about the experiences of Native youth. This article seeks to bring attention to Native youth in the scholarly conversation about school discipline disparities. It summarizes extant research and data showing that Native youth disproportionately experience exclusionary discipline. It identifies barriers that may contribute to the lack of in-depth research on Native youth. Finally, it describes theoretical insights gleaned from the small subset of school discipline research focused on Native youth that can enrich future work.

KEYWORDS:

• Native
• indigenous
• Indian
• school discipline
• racial disparity
• racial disproportionality
• race

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. I use the term Indigenous youth to refer to all youth affiliated with groups Indigenous to the present-day United States. This category includes American Indian and Alaska Native youth, Kānaka Maoli (Native Hawaiians), Chamorros, Carolinians, and Samoans. It may include children affiliated with Indigenous groups recognized by Canada or Mexico, including groups whose territory spans the U.S. border. This article focuses on American Indian and Alaska Native youth. It uses that term, or the abbreviation “AI/AN,” when referring to data that identifies students based on the census category of the same name. It uses the term “Native” when referring to the group generally or to data that does not specify a category definition. Research suggests that non-AI/AN Indigenous youth are also disproportionately impacted by school discipline practices (de Brey et al., 2019; Hune & Yeo, 2010; Lee, 2018; Nguyen et al., 2019), and further research should focus on other subgroups of Indigenous youth.

2. Liebler and Zacher (2013) surveyed census respondents to determine why some AI/AN respondents did not respond to the question about tribal affiliation. They found that most people who identify as AI/AN-only are twice as likely to report a tribal affiliation than those who identify as AI/AN in combination with another race, and that different factors seemed to explain non-response between the two groups.

3. At the time of publication, the number of schools identified on the BIE website was slightly different from the number provided here, but the web site also reported inconsistent numbers on different pages.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the UNLV Boyd School of Law.

Notes on contributors

Addie C. Rolnick

Addie C. Rolnick is the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians Professor of Law at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, William S. Boyd School of Law. She is the Faculty Director of the Indian Nations Gaming & Governance Program and the Associate Director of the Program on Race, Gender & Policing. Lena Rieke, Danielle Oberlander, and the Weiner-Rogers Law Library provided research assistance.