Students in alternative schools experience extraordinarily high lost-instruction rates, with Black boys losing 235 days per 100 enrolled¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · associational r2 · q2
Currency · newest study 2020 · checked against its sources 2026-10-20 (automated, 1 of 1 entry) · not reviewed by a person · overdue for a recheck since 2025: baselines and conditions change

Subclaims¶

q2 i? In the nation's alternative schools (excluding juvenile justice schools), Black boys lost 235 days per 100 students and boys with disabilities lost 170 days per 100 at the secondary level. → Losen 2020

Evidence¶

Losen 2020¶

Losen, D. J., & Martinez, P. (2020). Lost opportunities: How disparate school discipline continues to drive differences in the opportunity to learn. Learning Policy Institute; Center for Civil Rights Remedies at the Civil Rights Project, UCLA. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED608537

q2 · i? · associational · r2

First-of-its-kind descriptive analysis of 2015-16 CRDC data for alternative schools, excluding juvenile justice system schools, quoting the printed per-group rates. The report calls this the first documentation of alternative schools' lost-instruction rates.

"Black boys lost 235 days per 100 students. Black girls lost 156 days per 100 students. Boys with disabilities lost 170 days per 100 students."

Discussion¶

Learner Variables¶

• Gender — predictor: outcomes differ by group: a gap reflecting circumstances and treatment, not a cause

Related Claims¶

• Race-by-gender disparities are more pronounced: Black boys lost 132 days per 100 enrolled and Black girls lost 77, seven times the rate of White girls — related
• Secondary students lose instruction due to out-of-school suspensions at more than five times the rate of elementary students (37 vs. 7 days per 100 enrolled) — related
• Black secondary students lost 103 days of instruction per 100 enrolled, 82 more days than their White peers — related
• Intersecting identities compound suspension risk: 0.1% of Asian girls without special education services in elementary schools were suspended versus 27% of Black boys with disabilities in secondary schools — related
• Black students are suspended at the highest rate of any racial group, at 12% in 2017–18, with persistent disparities across all years analyzed — related
• Students with disabilities are suspended at more than twice the rate of students without disabilities, and Black students with disabilities face the highest risk at 19% — related
• In many large districts, secondary students lost more than a year of instruction per 100 enrolled, up to 416 days in Grand Rapids, MI — related
• Racial differences in suspension rates reflect policies and adult biases, not differences in behavior — related
• African American boys received out-of-school suspensions at five times the rate of white/Asian boys in CPS high schools in 2013-14 — related