North Cook News

Hispanic students, constituting 13.5% or 39 of Forest View Elementary School's total student population of 288, accounted for 12 out of the 23 total suspensions (52.2%) in the 2021-22 school year, averaging roughly one suspension per three students, according to the latest student discipline report by the Illinois State Board of Education.

During the same period, Forest View Elementary School's 109 white students, who make up 37.8% of the school population, received one suspension. This translates to an average of one suspension per 109 white students, which is definitively lower than that of Hispanic students, making them the best-behaved racial group in the school.

Of the 23 total suspensions at Forest View Elementary School in the 2021-22 school year, 18 were in-school suspensions and five out-of-school suspensions.

According to the report, in the 2021-22 school year, six student suspensions at Forest View Elementary School were for violence-related offenses.

The most common infraction causing suspension was violence offenses, tallying six cases - 26.1% of the total infractions.

During the 2021-22 school year, Forest View Elementary School reported 37 students - equivalent to 12.7% of its student body - as chronically truant, meaning they had a repeated pattern of unexcused lateness or missing classes. In addition, 76 students, or 26.3% of the student population, fell into the chronically absent category, a broader measure that includes all absences, excused or not.

Hispanic students were notably overrepresented in these statistics, comprising 30.8% 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	39	12	0.31
Black	29	10	0.34
White	109	1	0.01