Table 20. Number and percentage distribution of serious disciplinary actions taken by public schools, by selected school characteristics: 1999

School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS)

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Table 20. Number and percentage distribution of serious disciplinary actions taken by public schools, by selected school characteristics: 1999–2000

School characteristic	Removals with no services		Transfers to specialized schools ¹		Out-of-school suspensions		Total removals and transfers
School characteristic	Number	Percent	Number	Percent	Number	Percent	Number	Percent
All public schools	127,176	11	75,955	7	959,506	83	203,130	17

Level
Elementary	41,445	16	6,020	2	212,562	82	47,465	18
Middle	32,146	8	26,804	7	323,122	85	58,950	15
Secondary	48,259	11	40,063	9	370,566	81	88,323	19
Combined	5,325	9	3,067	5	53,256	86	8,392	14

Enrollment size
Less than 300	4,968	8	3,113	5	56,357	87	8,081	13
300–499	15,206	12	7,852	6	106,852	82	23,058	18
500–999	67,902	12	25,850	5	464,756	83	93,751	17
1,000 or more	39,100	10	39,140	10	331,540	81	78,240	19

Urbanicity
City	61,115	15	31,452	8	323,148	78	92,567	22
Urban fringe	32,880	8	25,965	7	328,848	85	58,845	15
Town	18,947	12	6,584	4	126,882	83	25,530	17
Rural	14,234	7	11,954	6	180,627	87	26,188	13

Crime level where students live ²
High	5,418	3	9,989	5	166,687	92	15,407	8
Moderate	33,724	12	19,472	7	238,953	82	53,196	18
Low	53,941	12	32,436	7	380,344	81	86,378	19
Mixed	32,370	15	13,740	6	170,492	79	46,109	21

Percent minority enrollment²
0–5 percent	17,520	9	8,169	4	180,182	88	25,689	12
6–20 percent	31,367	12	13,144	5	217,277	83	44,511	17
21–50 percent	36,684	14	18,556	7	204,358	79	55,240	21
More than 50 percent	39,551	9	35,780	8	351,191	82	75,331	18

Percent of students eligible for free/reduced-price lunch
0–20 percent	26,297	10	17,903	7	224,048	84	44,200	16
21–50 percent	73,221	16	27,149	6	349,643	78	100,370	22
More than 50 percent	27,658	6	30,902	7	385,815	87	58,560	13

Percent of students below 15th percentile on standardized tests
0–5 percent	25,624	13	15,004	8	155,893	79	40,628	21
6–15 percent	66,638	13	29,318	6	413,455	81	95,956	19
More than 15 percent	34,914	8	31,633	7	390,158	85	66,546	15

Percent of students likely to attend college
0–35 percent	32,205	8	28,341	7	342,803	85	60,547	15
36–60 percent	67,177	16	23,209	5	340,199	79	90,386	21
More than 60 percent	27,794	8	24,404	7	276,504	84	52,198	16

Percent of students who consider academic achievement important
0–25 percent	8,622	8	9,306	9	89,202	83	17,929	17
26–50 percent	34,036	10	19,042	6	291,003	85	53,078	15
51–75 percent	50,244	12	24,055	6	350,925	83	74,299	17
More than 75 percent	34,273	12	23,551	8	228,375	80	57,825	20

Percent male enrollment
0–44 percent	14,306	12	9,958	8	96,454	80	24,264	20
45–55 percent	106,764	11	56,893	6	774,203	83	163,657	17
More than 55 percent	6,106	6	9,103	9	88,848	85	15,209	15

Student/teacher ratio²,³
Less than 12	18,115	9	14,075	7	172,870	84	32,190	16
12–16	45,449	9	29,022	6	426,447	85	74,471	15
More than 16	59,088	16	27,793	7	294,090	77	86,881	23

Number of classroom changes²
0–3 changes	18,802	17	4,464	4	86,940	79	23,267	21
4–6 changes	44,034	8	42,661	8	451,226	84	86,695	16
More than 6 changes	57,928	14	24,482	6	340,860	81	82,410	19

Use of paid law enforcement ⁴
Regular use	84,177	9	69,528	7	787,533	84	153,705	16
No regular use	42,998	19	6,427	3	171,972	78	49,425	22

Number of serious discipline problems ⁵
No problems	38,757	15	12,935	5	211,185	80	51,691	20
1 problem	35,675	16	16,942	7	176,820	77	52,617	23
2 problems	24,775	10	18,036	7	207,148	83	42,811	17
3 or more problems	27,969	7	28,042	7	364,353	87	56,011	13

Transfers as percentage of enrollment²,⁶
0 to 6 percent	22,471	10	15,211	7	179,197	83	37,682	17
6 to 11 percent	10,893	6	10,715	6	150,294	87	21,608	13
11 to 21 percent	31,569	13	17,165	7	195,146	80	48,734	20
21 percent or more	60,042	13	27,135	6	388,563	82	87,178	18

Prevalence of schoolwide disruptions²,⁷
No disruptions	77,508	10	48,192	6	654,401	84	125,700	16
Any disruptions	23,341	8	21,964	7	251,161	85	45,305	15

Percent of students absent without excuses
None	11,025	15	5,357	7	57,397	78	16,382	22
1–2 percent	24,396	9	18,102	7	227,753	84	42,497	16
3–5 percent	55,711	13	21,869	5	346,829	82	77,580	18
6–10 percent	26,804	10	19,149	7	225,846	83	45,952	17
More than 10 percent	9,240	8	11,479	9	101,681	83	20,719	17

Prevalence of violent incidents²,⁸
No violent incidents	2,959	6	3,643	7	44,456	87	6,602	13
Any violent incidents	121,543	11	71,972	7	906,142	82	193,516	18
¹ Specialized school was defined for respondents as, "a school that is specifically for students who were referred for disciplinary reasons. The school may also have students who were referred for other reasons. The school may be at the same location as your school."
² Some schools are omitted from these categories because of missing data on their school characteristics. For this reason, the detailed results do not sum to the totals. See appendix J of 2000 School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS) Detailed Data Documentation (NCES 2004-307) for further information.
³ Student/teacher ratio was calculated by dividing the total number of students enrolled in the school by the total number of full-time equivalent teachers. The total number of full-time equivalent teachers is a combination of the full-time and part-time teachers, including special education teachers, with an adjustment to compensate for the part-time status.
⁴ Schools were included as regularly using paid law enforcement if they reported the use of paid law enforcement during any of the following times: at any time during school hours, while students were arriving or leaving, at selected school activities (e.g., athletic and social events, open houses, science fairs), or at any other time that the respondent specified.
⁵ Serious discipline problems is a count of discipline problems reported by principals. These discipline problems include student racial tensions, student bullying, student verbal abuse of teachers, widespread disorder in classrooms, and student acts of disrespect for teachers. If a principal reported that any of these problems occurred daily or weekly in their school, each was counted once in the total number of serious discipline problems. Undesirable gang activities and undesirable cult or extremist group activities were also counted once as a problem if the principal reported that these events occurred at all in their school.
⁶ Transfers as a percentage of enrollment combines the number of students who were transferred to a school and the number of students who were transferred from a school, divided by the total number of students enrolled in the school.
⁷ Schoolwide disruptions include actions that disrupted school activities such as bomb threats or anthrax threats. Respondents were instructed to exclude all fire alarms, including false alarms.
⁸ Violent incidents include rape, sexual battery other than rape, physical attack or fight with or without a weapon, threat of physical attack with or without a weapon, and robbery with or without a weapon.
NOTE: Detail may not sum to totals because of rounding. "At school/at your school" was defined for respondents as including activities happening in school buildings, on school grounds, on school buses, and at places that are holding school-sponsored events or activities. Respondents were instructed to, unless the survey specified otherwise, only respond for those times that were during normal school hours or when school activities/events were in session. A gang was defined for respondents as, "an ongoing loosely organized association of three or more persons, whether formal or informal, that has a common name, signs, symbols or colors, whose members engage, either individually or collectively, in violent or other forms of illegal behavior." Elementary schools are defined as schools in which the lowest grade is not higher than grade 3 and the highest grade is not higher than grade 8. Middle schools are defined as schools in which the lowest grade is not lower than grade 4 and the highest grade is not higher than grade 9. Secondary schools are defined as schools in which the lowest grade is not lower than grade 9 and the highest grade is not higher than grade 12. Combined schools include all other combinations of grades, including K–12 schools.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS), 2000.

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