Illinois Valley Times

Mendota Township High School District 280 reported 72 suspensions or expulsions for the 2021-22 school year, according to the latest student discipline report by the Illinois State Board of Education.

The district removed one student to alternative settings instead of suspending or expelling them. This equates to less than one percent of the 503 students enrolled.

Students were expelled for one incident with violence that caused physical injury, seven incidents with violence without physical injury, one incident with drugs.

Boy students received 42 suspensions, while 30 girls were suspended.

There were 72 high school students suspended in 2021-22 school year.

The district reported that most out-of-school suspensions were given for unspecified reasons, of which there were 63. There were seven incidents of violence without injury. For 37 incidents, students were suspended for two to three days.

Illinois ranks as the 5th state in terms of the overall number of schools and student enrollment among all states.

Illinois lawmakers enacted laws in 2015 to restrict schools from disciplining a disproportionate number of Black and minority students out of school and into the criminal justice system, often for minor misbehavior.

	In-school Suspension	Out-of-school Suspension
Alcohol		0
Violence with injury		1
Violence without injury		7
Drug offenses		1
Firearm		0
Other dangerous weapons		0
Tobacco		0
Other reason		63
Total		72

	In-school Suspension	Out-of-school Suspension
One day or less		0
1-2 days		12
2-3 days		37
3-4 days		18
4-10 days		5
More than 10 days		0