A significant percentage of students who get in trouble at school are not frequent flyers!  They may get in trouble once or twice a school year.  When they do get referred to the office, the dynamics can be rather sticky.

Over the decades, deference traditionally shown by the public to school administrators has waned.  Every action is open to careful scrutiny in the court of public (parent) opinion.  Parents have always been protective of their children, but it seems like there are many more "damned if you do; damned if you don't" scenarios playing out in discipline decisions these days.

When a referral is submitted at school, it is typically in response to either a pattern of behavior that has escalated to the point of warranting office intervention---or---an incident that was significant enough in and of itself to warrant the escalation. 

There are also occasions when the student body is made aware of a "point of emphasis"...a rule or policy that will be more aggressively enforced until improvement in that area is met.  So, for instance, if gum is not allowed in the auditorium it might be enforced less aggressively than it will be once chewed gum has been found on the seats and floor of that auditorium.  When it becomes a substantial problem, the student body is notified that this problem warrants more aggressive monitoring and the consequences for breaking the rule will be greater until further notice.  Then, the matter is considered "disobedience/disrespect" rather than merely "chewing gum in the Auditorium."  I've seen this applied to everything from fighting to not turning in homework... a full range of issues.

Once a discipline matter becomes an office matter, students are typically assigned a consequence for their misbehavior.  Sometimes consequences assigned are the same regardless of which particular student broke the rule.  At other times, students' overall discipline records are considered a factor warranting different consequences.  These matters get particularly sticky when some students receive consequences, but others in trouble for the same thing get no consequence.  Furthermore, educators get frustrated with the school office quickly when they feel like their referrals are in vain.

Accordingly, it is very common for students to receive consequences for being referred to the office in a properly run school.  Furthermore, many administrators feel that if any student receives a consequence for a particular behavior, so too should the others...even if there is some difference in exactly what the consequence is.  The proverbial "slap on the wrist" is considered appropriate for even our most angelic rule breakers.  They are young people and, as such, their development requires reminders of boundaries and limits.  Beyond that, it becomes a "for the good of the order" consideration.

We all know the traditional office consequences--- detentions, Saturday school, in-school suspension, out-of-school suspension, and more.  Most of these are management headaches for schools.  There are many reasons why this is so.

I will expand on these facts in my next post as a way of introducing a new consequence option for school discipline.  This is a discipline consequence that is more of a "slap on the wrist."  It is both easy to manage and more progressive in design.  In particular, it is a more appropriate, tangible starting point for addressing both rare and more episodic misbehavior...like that many of our non-"frequent flyers" are referred to the office for.