North Egypt News

Frankfort Community Unit School District 168 reported 3,427 suspensions and nine expulsions just during the 2023-24 school year, according to the Illinois Report Card.

In total, there were 3,436 disciplinary actions recorded during the school year, representing a rate of approximately 228.6 incidents per 100 of the district’s enrolled students.

The expulsions were issued for three incidents involving violence without physical injury, two incidents involving alcohol and tobacco, and three incidents involving drugs.

Among in-school suspensions where a reason was specified, the most common cause was incidents involving violence without physical injury, with 550 recorded cases. There were also 71 incidents involving violence that caused physical injury. Additionally, 2,621 cases were classified under "other reason" or left unspecified.

There were 2,506 disciplinary incidents involving male students. Another 930 incidents involved female students.

Of all suspensions issued in the district, 2,613 involved elementary or middle school students, while 814 involved high school students.

Out-of-school suspensions most commonly were for incidents involving violence without physical injury, with 36 cases reported. Additionally, 52 cases were classified under the "other reason" category.

In terms of ethnicity, white students, who made up 94.2% of the Frankfort Community Unit School District 168 student body, were suspended or expelled the most in the district, with 3,162 suspensions and eight expulsions reported during the 2023-24 school year. They were followed by multiracial students, who made up 1.4% of the student body, and received 147 suspensions and were expelled once.

Illinois has approved a 2025 budget that allocates $8.6 billion to K-12 education, a $350 million increase from the previous fiscal year—the minimum required under the state funding formula.

In 2024, Illinois registered a teacher retention rate of almost 90%. Yet, around 91% of superintendents reported having a 'serious' problem teacher shortage problem. In total, almost 4,100 teaching positions remained vacant by the end of the year.

“They’re putting a substitute in there, that’s somebody with a four-year degree that’s not in teaching. They’re using a retired teacher…or worse than that, they’re canceling the class, putting the kids in other classrooms, putting them in study hall, but those are strategies we have to use if there’s no qualified teacher,” said Beth Crider, regional superintendent of Peoria County Regional Office of Education #48.

Type of Incident	In-School Suspension	Out-of-School Suspension	Expelled
Alcohol	-	1	-
Violence with injury	71	30	-
Violence without injury	550	36	3
Drug offenses	5	16	3
Firearm	-	-	-
Other dangerous weapons	1	1	-
Tobacco	39	4	2
Other reason	2,621	52	1
Total	3,287	140	9

Duration	In-School Suspension	Out-of-School Suspension
One day or less	72	5
1-2 days	2,845	32
2-3 days	247	39
3-4 days	80	33
4-10 days	38	19
More than 10 days	5	12