Giving Compass' Take:

• David Washburn reports on the findings of recent research that shows that students lost more than 11 million days of school thanks to suspensions during 2015-16.

• California has made some progress, how can other states follow suit? 

• This is important because suspensions hurt students academically. 

Children in America’s public schools lost more than 11 million instructional days due to suspensions during the 2015-16 school year, with California students losing nearly 750,000 days, according to a report released this week by the ACLU and the UCLA Civil Rights Project.

The report, based on federal government data, also found that racial disparities in suspensions remain an acute problem. Nationwide, African-American students lost 66 days of instruction per 100 students enrolled in 2015-16, which is five times as many days as white students lost.

In California, meanwhile, there are four times as many white students enrolled in public schools as African-American students, yet the total number of instructional days lost by African-American students due to suspension was nearly the same as the number of days lost by whites — 141,000 for African Americans compared with 151,000 for whites, the report said.

Though they were critical of the wide racial disparities, the report’s authors said California’s efforts in recent years to reduce suspensions are bearing fruit. They pointed out that the overall state average of 12 days of lost instruction from suspensions for every 100 students enrolled is essentially half of the nationwide average of 23 days.

In some states, including Michigan, North Carolina and Virginia, students lost three times as many days to suspensions in 2015-16 than those in California. The District of Columbia, with 51 lost days per 100 students, was highest in the nation, according to the report.

Read the full article about suspensions by David Washburn at EdSource.