Chicago City Wire

Black students, constituting 3.1% or 12 of Grimes Elementary School's total student population of 393, accounted for two out of the three total suspensions (66.7%) in the 2021-22 school year, averaging one suspension per six students, according to the latest student discipline report by the Illinois State Board of Education.

During the same period, Grimes Elementary School's 342 Hispanic students, who make up 87% of the school population, received one suspension. This translates to an average of one suspension per 342 Hispanic students, which is definitively lower than that of Black students, making them the best-behaved racial group in the school.

Of the three total suspensions at Grimes Elementary School in the 2021-22 school year, two were in-school suspensions and one out-of-school suspension.

According to the report, in the 2021-22 school year, one student suspension at Grimes Elementary School was for a violence-related offense.

The most common infraction causing suspension was violence offenses, tallying one cases - 33.3% of the total infractions.

During the 2021-22 school year, Grimes Elementary School reported 159 students - equivalent to 40.4% of its student body - as chronically truant, meaning they had a repeated pattern of unexcused lateness or missing classes. In addition, 148 students, or 37.6% 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	342	1	0
Black	12	2	0.17