An essay that appeared recently in The Washington Post has brought renewed attention to discipline disparities taking place across all school levels, even in preschool. In the essay, black mother Tunette Powell wrote that her two preschool-aged sons have been suspended from schools a total of eight times, and she wonders if these suspensions might be the result of unintentional biases against black students.

The Huffington Post, reporting on the issue, noted research indicating that black preschool students attending state-funded programs were more than five times more likely to be expelled than Asian-American children and two times as likely to be expelled than white and Latino children.

In addition, U.S. Department of Education data show that though black students accounted for only 18 percent of preschoolers in the 2011- 12 school year, 42 percent of these students were suspended once that year, and 48 percent received multiple suspensions.

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Article by Celine Provini, EducationWorld Editor