The Center on Race and Social Problems has received a $500,000 grant from The Heinz Endowments for an expansion of Dr. James Huguley's Just Discipline Project. Interim Director and Assistant Professor Dr. Huguley will serve as the PI, with Dr. Ming-Te Wang from the University of Pittsburgh School of Education is the project Co-principal investigator.
The Just Discipline Regional Impact Model is an expansion of a collaboration between The Heinz Endowments, two University of Pittsburgh Centers (Center on Race and Social Problems and the Motivation Center), and the Woodland Hills Schools District, designed to address the school-to-prison pipeline in a high African American, low-income schools.
The first two years of the Just Discipline program saw significant gains across multiple key outcomes at the Woodland Hills Intermediate School: 28% fewer students received suspensions; office referrals were down 30%; students felt 19% safer; and achievement increased in math, language arts, and science—in two cases reversing previously downward trends. These outcomes were also duplicated and exceeded in a 1-year partnership with Lincoln Elementary school in 2017-2018, where Just Discipline leaders trained staff and helped them implement the model. Lincoln actually experienced a 90% reduction in suspensions, and similar academic gains in math, science, and language arts.
Building on these successes, Dr. Huguley and the Just Discipline Team will use the new funding to expand this partnership into the Just Discipline Regional Impact Model, which improves on the original design by adding additional staff at schools in order to expand their reach and to increase the student to restorative practitioner ratio. In addition, after a successful first implementation phase, Just Discipline investigators have been moving more squarely into an advocacy role for the necessary practice and policy changes that will bring greater equity and racial justice in school discipline.
“We hear from teachers and administrators all the time that they actually don’t want to use suspensions as much as they’re used,” notes Dr. Huguley. “But at the same time, they don’t have the tools to effectively implement more relational and restorative practices effectively. Are program partners with schools to provide necessary resources, document progress, and communicate those results to the rest of the field.”
The Heinz Endowments has been supporting the Just Discipline Project since its inception in 2016, and this funding will support years 2 and 3 of this new phase of the work.
The Heinz Endowments is devoted to the mission of helping our region prosper as a vibrant center of creativity, learning, and social, economic, and environmental sustainability. Core to our work is the vision of a just community where all are included and where everyone who calls southwestern Pennsylvania home has a real and meaningful opportunity to thrive.