North Egypt News

Black students, constituting 27.9% or 175 of Dr. Nick Osborne Primary Center's total student population of 627, accounted for 35 out of the 84 total suspensions (41.7%) in the 2021-22 school year, averaging one suspension per five students, according to the latest student discipline report by the Illinois State Board of Education.

During the same period, Dr. Nick Osborne Primary Center's 293 white students, who make up 46.7% of the school population, received 18 suspensions. This translates to an average of roughly one suspension per 16 white students, which is definitively lower than that of Black students, making them the best-behaved racial group in the school.

Of the 84 total suspensions at Dr. Nick Osborne Primary Center in the 2021-22 school year, 74 were in-school suspensions and 10 out-of-school suspensions.

During the 2021-22 school year, Dr. Nick Osborne Primary Center reported 15 students - equivalent to 2.4% of its student body - as chronically truant, meaning they had a repeated pattern of unexcused lateness or missing classes. In addition, 140 students, or 22.3% of the student population, fell into the chronically absent category, a broader measure that includes all absences, excused or not.

Black students were notably overrepresented in these statistics, comprising 27% of all students who were chronically absent.

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	35	10	0.29
Black	175	35	0.2
Multiracial	107	21	0.2
White	293	18	0.06