East Central Reporter

Hispanic students, constituting 3.4% or 10 of Arthur-Lovington/Atwood-Hammond High School's total student population of 298, accounted for three out of the 61 total suspensions (4.9%) in the 2021-22 school year, averaging roughly one suspension per three students, according to the latest student discipline report by the Illinois State Board of Education.

During the same period, Arthur-Lovington/Atwood-Hammond High School's 279 white students, who make up 93.6% of the school population, received 45 suspensions. This translates to an average of roughly one suspension per six white students, which is definitively lower than that of Hispanic students, making them the best-behaved racial group in the school.

Of the 61 total suspensions at Arthur-Lovington/Atwood-Hammond High School in the 2021-22 school year, 59 were in-school suspensions and two out-of-school suspensions. Instead of opting for traditional suspensions or expulsions for some cases, the school administration decided to relocate one student to alternative educational settings.

According to the report, in the 2021-22 school year, five student suspensions at Arthur-Lovington/Atwood-Hammond High School were for offenses including drugs.

During the 2021-22 school year, Arthur-Lovington/Atwood-Hammond High School reported 37 students - equivalent to 12.5% of its student body - as chronically truant, meaning they had a repeated pattern of unexcused lateness or missing classes. In addition, 74 students, or 24.7% of the student population, fell into the chronically absent category, a broader measure that includes all absences, excused or not.

In a broader context, data from the ProPublica database indicates that Black students are suspended at a rate 4.6 times higher than white students in Illinois—surpassing the already high national average rate of 3.9 times.

However, districts’ officials deny a direct link between these statistics and race. Lisa Small, the Superintendent of District 211, argues that these numbers oversimplify the situation. “Decisions are highly individualized and based on the specific behavior and are not well-suited to a simple numerical analysis,” she wrote in a statement. “They are not a statistic to us, but a developing young adult.”

Illinois ranks 12th in the nation for the highest rate of suspensions among Black students relative to their white peers.

Race	Number of Students	Total Infractions	Infractions Per Student
Hispanic	10	3	0.3
White	279	45	0.16