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Every day, students from marginalized communities disproportionately face adversity and trauma. It is well documented that exposure to adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) can impact children's ability to focus, learn, and even regulate their emotions. Many schools, rather than providing multi-tiered systems of support to address the root causes of behavior, place these students at greater risk of experiencing health disparities through the use of exclusionary school discipline (ESD) practices. ESDs not only deny students important educational opportunities, but also can compound existing social, economic, and health inequities. Thus, ESD practices must be understood as more than simply impacting what happens in the classroom. Instead, they should be conceptualized as public health policies with far-reaching impacts on a child's lifelong health and well-being. Even though school discipline has largely been overlooked by the public health community, current reform efforts are one aspect of a holistic health justice framework. This article seeks to begin to bridge current gaps in the literature and public discourse by identifying key linkages between ESD practices and health. It then presents evidence-based design principles to ensure education policy is aligned with a health justice framework. And finally, it explores a specific school-based intervention, restorative justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses what the author refers to as Missouri's exclusionary approach to school discipline as of 2016, and it mentions the U.S. Federal Government's involvement in education, the history of state and local control of education in places such as Missouri, and the legal rights of the gatekeepers of school discipline, suspension, and expulsion. Missouri's state discipline statutes are addressed, along with the Constitutions of Missouri and the U.S.

The article examines the consequences of the U.S. school-to-prison link or school-to-prison pipeline, a term used to describe the increasing patterns of contact students have with the juvenile and adult criminal justice systems as a result of the practices implemented by educational institutions such as use of police in schools. Topics discussed include discipline practices of public schools and impact of exclusionary school discipline on student behavior and academic progress.

This article argues that school choice/competition ought to play a central role in determining school discipline policy. Unfortunately, the status quo emphasizes disciplinary rules established by central authorities and school choice is often limited. The author provides an overview of these issues and presents a model of rules- versus discretion-based discipline policies and school choice. Policies that suppress school choice lead to inflexible and unsatisfactory discipline policies, and centralized discipline policies reduce the positive aspects of school choice. Stronger incentives for schools are expected to help remedy this and vigorous school choice/competition is likely to be an avenue for doing so. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]