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Composite story

Education Department tells schools to stop considering race in student discipline

A Dear Colleague letter says weighing race or racial disparities in discipline is itself discrimination. Civil rights groups call that a rollback; the department opened probes in Fayetteville and Milwaukee.

On Aug. 18, 2026, the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights told federally funded schools they must not consider race in student discipline, calling that ‘racial balancing’ and unlawful under Title VI. The letter follows a July rule dropping disparate-impact regulations and an April 2025 Trump executive order. OCR opened Title VI investigations in Fayetteville, Arkansas, and Milwaukee. Reuters, EdWeek and NPR quote EdTrust’s Eric Duncan and others saying schools cannot fix discipline gaps by ignoring race; Daily Signal and District Administration lead with Kimberly Richey’s statement that equity rules required different punishment by race.

Shared facts

It tells those schools to ensure students are not treated differently based on race, color, or national origin in discipline.

In the new guidance Richey does not just warn schools against this kind of balancing.

Richey said you cannot take race into account when disciplining students, and racial balancing must end.

A department press release said Fayetteville teachers were directed to take students’ racial identities into account in discipline as part of restorative justice.

Fayetteville is one of two districts being investigated; the other is Milwaukee Public Schools.

Richey said the left’s pursuit of equity required schools to discipline students differently based on race.

Schools needed to look hard at their data for meaningful racial disparities.

The letter says Title VI and the Constitution prohibit intentional discrimination, not unintentional disparate impact.

The Aug. 18 letter comes less than a month after a final rule eliminating disparate-impact regulations.

This month’s guidance was signed by Kimberly Richey, the current head of OCR.

In April 2025 Trump signed an executive order titled Reinstating Common Sense School Discipline Policies.

The eliminated regulations went back more than 60 years.

The letter urges federally funded schools to establish a safe, well-ordered disciplinary system.

The letter itself does not carry the force of law.

In December 2018 the first Trump administration issued guidance formally rescinding Lhamon’s.

If so, they could be investigated by the U.S. government.

The department said Milwaukee education leaders derided facially neutral policies as reflecting systemic whiteness.

In 2023 Lhamon again advised schools they could be held accountable if discipline data revealed concerning disparities.

The letter says a facially neutral mandatory-punishment policy evenhandedly enforced and not adopted because of race is not race discrimination.

Disputed facts

Civil rights groups, including EdTrust, reject this view.

Shared opinions

Richey said today’s guidance clarifies Title VI’s legal requirements and ends these harmful practices.

It says students who should have been suspended or expelled remained in the classroom.

Disputed opinions

None yet.

Reuters

US tells schools not to alter discipline policies to reduce racial disparities

Kanishka Singh

19 Aug 2026

Facts

Federal civil rights data has shown Black students are disciplined at disproportionately high rates.

The new guidance says schools cannot modify discipline policies simply to reduce such racial disparities.

A 2023 Education Department report found Black public preschool children received out-of-school suspensions at a rate nearly twice their enrollment.

President Trump has acted against diversity initiatives, which he calls discriminatory against white people and males.

EdTrust P-12 policy director Eric Duncan criticized the latest guidance.

Duncan said Black students have long faced some of the harshest discipline in the nation’s schools.

The 2023 report showed Black boys were nearly twice as likely as white boys to receive an out-of-school suspension or expulsion in K-12.

Data from the 2023 report also showed that Black boys were nearly twice as likely as white boys to receive an out-of-school suspension or expulsion in K-12 public schools while Black girls were nearly twice as likely to receive one or more in-school suspensions, one or more out-of-school suspensions, and expulsions than white girls.

fact

Black girls were nearly twice as likely as white girls to receive in-school suspensions, out-of-school suspensions, and expulsions.

Data from the 2023 report also showed that Black boys were nearly twice as likely as white boys to receive an out-of-school suspension or expulsion in K-12 public schools while Black girls were nearly twice as likely to receive one or more in-school suspensions, one or more out-of-school suspensions, and expulsions than white girls.

fact

Opinion

The move prompted concerns that the Trump administration is making it harder to address longstanding racial disparities in school discipline.

WASHINGTON, Aug 19 (Reuters) - The U.S. Education Department has issued guidance urging schools to stop what it calls "racial balancing" in student discipline policies, prompting concerns that the Trump administration is making it harder to address longstanding racial disparities in school discipline.

left · pluralist

Civil rights advocates say Trump’s actions are rolling back social progress by removing practices aimed at helping marginalized groups.

District Administration

Race removed as school discipline factor by new guidance

Micah Ward

18 Aug 2026

Facts

The guidance is aimed at schools receiving federal funding.

Those provisions identified discrimination based on statistics, regardless of intent.

Last month, the Education Department scrapped decades-old disparate impact provisions, which identified discrimination based on statistics, regardless of intent.

These provisions relied on "demographic data alone" to determine whether a school violated civil rights law, officials said at the time.

fact

A letter signed by 60 civil rights groups argued that discrimination is not always explicit or overt.

Civil rights groups criticized the July decision at the time.

The groups said overhauling the regulations without public comment was indefensible.

"While undermining civil rights protections is never justified, the Department's move to overhaul these anti-discrimination regulations without even providing the public with an opportunity to comment is indefensible," the letter reads.

attribution · 60 civil rights groups

Opinion

District Administration said superintendents are no longer required to make discipline outcomes racially proportional.

District Administration said that without the provisions, educators can discipline without fear of investigation.

They cited school closures and disciplinary policies that appear neutral but unfairly harm minority students.

The Daily Signal

Department of Education to No Longer Require School Discipline Policies That Discriminate on the Basis of Race

Tyler O'Neil

18 Aug 2026

Facts

Richey said OCR will vigorously enforce Title VI so discipline systems are neutral, fair, and nondiscriminatory.

ED and DOJ issued a January 2014 Dear Colleague letter on discipline and Title VI.

The Department of Education and the Department of Justice had issued a "Dear Colleague" letter in January 2014 stating that schools could still violate Title VI, and therefore lose federal funding, if their disciplinary programs led to adverse outcomes for students of certain races—despite not intentionally discriminating on the basis of race.

fact

Richey’s statement was first provided to the Daily Signal.

"For too long, the Left's pursuit of 'equity' has perversely required schools to discipline students differently, based on their race; it has prevented teachers from keeping their classrooms safe, put students in harm's way, and severely compromised student learning opportunities," Kimberly Richey, assistant secretary for civil rights, said in a statement first provided to the Daily Signal.

fact

A 2018 Federal Commission on School Safety report said schools ignored or covered up misconduct because of the 2014 letter.

A 2018 report from the Federal Commission on School Safety found that, due to the 2014 letter, "schools ignored or covered up—rather than disciplined—student misconduct in order to avoid any purported racial disparity in discipline numbers that might catch the eye of the federal government."

fact

A 2020 Heritage Foundation report concluded that adopting racial quotas in school discipline is illegal, unjustified, and counterproductive.

Opinion

Trump’s order claimed previous administrations misinterpreted Title VI.

K-12 Dive

OCR calls on schools to 'stop racial balancing' in new discipline guidance

18 Aug 2026

Facts

The Education Department on Tuesday issued school discipline guidance for district leaders.

The U.S. Department of Education on Tuesday issued school discipline guidance for district leaders, rebuffing previous Democratic administrations' attempts to reduce discipline disparities for Black and other historically marginalized students and calling for schools to "stop racial balancing."

fact

Richey said neither Title VI nor the Constitution requires the use of race in student discipline.

"This guidance makes clear that neither Title VI nor the Constitution requires the use of race in student discipline," Kimberly Richey, assistant secretary for civil rights, said in the new guidance.

"Neither Title VI nor the Constitution prohibits unintentional disparate impact; nor do they require schools to consider race in student discipline to address an unintentional disparate impact."

attribution · Kimberly Richey

The Obama administration cited data that African American students without disabilities were more than three times as likely as white peers without disabilities to be expelled or suspended.

The Obama administration cited federal civil rights data showing that African American students without disabilities were more than three times as likely as their White peers without disabilities to be expelled or suspended.

fact

Disparate impact is when a facially neutral discipline policy is disproportionately applied against Black or other student subgroups.

Former federal civil rights attorneys said districts can expect disparate-impact investigations to be closed or narrowed.

Following the tool's rescission last month, former federal civil rights attorneys said districts can expect their investigations related to disparate impact to be closed or narrowed.

attribution · former federal civil rights attorneys

The letter criticizes Obama and Biden crackdowns on schools for disparate-impact investigations, which were paused under the first Trump administration.

Tuesday's Dear Colleague letter to schools criticizes the Obama and Biden administrations' crackdown on schools for disparate impact investigations — which were paused under the first Trump administration — calling the Trump administration's approach "better" and one that creates "safer and better environments for learning."

fact

Title VI prevents discrimination based on race, national origin and ethnicity.

Disparate impact cases against school districts became popular under the second Obama administration when it issued a 2014 Dear Colleague letter on school discipline and enforcement of Title VI, which prevents discrimination based on race, national origin and ethnicity.

fact

The letter said racial-outcome data can be evidence but cannot substitute for whether the school intentionally discriminated.

Although disparate outcome data can be used as evidence in civil rights discrimination cases, the letter said the data "cannot substitute for the ultimate inquiry — whether the school intentionally discriminated based on race."

fact

Opinion

K-12 Dive said the letter rebuffs prior Democratic administrations’ attempts to reduce discipline disparities for Black and other marginalized students.

The U.S. Department of Education on Tuesday issued school discipline guidance for district leaders, rebuffing previous Democratic administrations' attempts to reduce discipline disparities for Black and other historically marginalized students and calling for schools to "stop racial balancing."

center · pluralist

K-12 Dive said that can happen because of unintentional bias or prejudice by school employees.

The department called its approach better and one that creates safer, better environments for learning.

Tuesday's Dear Colleague letter to schools criticizes the Obama and Biden administrations' crackdown on schools for disparate impact investigations — which were paused under the first Trump administration — calling the Trump administration's approach "better" and one that creates "safer and better environments for learning."

attribution · Education Department

Former civil rights attorneys said intentional-discrimination cases are much harder to investigate and prove than disparate-impact cases.

Former federal civil rights enforcement attorneys, however, have said such cases are much more difficult to investigate and prove compared to unintentional discrimination as a result of applying policies unevenly.

attribution · former federal civil rights enforcement attorneys

Education Week

Education Department Tells Schools Race Can't Factor Into Student Discipline

Mark Walsh

18 Aug 2026

Facts

That rule was issued on a fast track without a public comment period.

The Aug. 18 dear colleague letter comes less than a month after the Education Department issued a final rule, on a fast track without a public comment period, that eliminated regulations going back more than 60 years recognizing liability for disparate impact, such as when statistics demonstrate a discriminatory effect of a school policy on discipline rates or other matters involving groups of students, even when there is no intentional bias.

fact

That order directed Secretary Linda McMahon to develop guidance telling schools not to take race into account when addressing student behavior.

The letter also follows an April 2025 executive order from President Donald Trump in which he directed Secretary of Education Linda McMahon to develop guidance for schools instructing them not to take race into account when addressing student behavior.

fact

The letter says the July regulation ends a whipsawing effect of different administrations’ approaches to disparate impact.

The letter says future administrations must reject disparate-impact liability and adhere to Title VI’s original public meaning.

Adaku Onyeka-Crawford directs the Opportunity to Learn program at the Advancement Project.

Adaku Onyeka-Crawford, director of the Opportunity to Learn program at the Advancement Project, a civil rights organization, said via email that the new guidance "will at best, ignore, or at worst, threaten schools that strive to ensure that Black, Indigenous and other students of color are not disproportionately deprived of educational opportunities by unfair or harsh discipline."

fact

The letter concludes it is race discrimination to evaluate racial discipline outcomes and decide based on those outcomes.

Richey wrote that the 2014 guidance pressured administrators to adopt race-based disciplinary policies without a finding of fault.

The Obama administration's 2014 guidance embraced the use of disparate-impact analysis and had the effect of "pressuring school administrators to adopt race-based disciplinary policies or practices without regard to any finding of fault, and without regard to their deleterious effects on school safety and orderliness," Richey says in the letter.

attribution · Kimberly M. Richey

Richey said the effect was to push schools to ease enforcement, especially when disciplining a student of a given race might overrepresent that race in totals.

"The effect was to push schools to ramp down enforcement generally, and especially to ramp it down when disciplining a student of a given race might lead to students of that race being overrepresented in aggregate discipline incidents as compared to students of other races," Richey said.

attribution · Kimberly M. Richey

Carolyn Gorman is a fellow at the Manhattan Institute.

The Dear Colleague letter is 20 pages.

Opinion

Richey said imposing disparate-impact liability was never sound as a matter of law or justice.

"The imposition was never sound as a matter of law or justice, and, as this guidance explains, schools must cease consideration of race throughout their disciplinary policies and practices, absent truly extraordinary circumstances."

attribution · Kimberly M. Richey

Richey said students, parents, teachers, and schools have been hamstrung by erroneous interpretations of federal law.

Richey said students, parents, teachers, and schools have been "hamstrung by erroneous interpretations" of federal law, citing various forms of guidance issued under Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, both Democrats.

attribution · Kimberly M. Richey

EdTrust P-12 director Eric Duncan called it an expansive view of race-blind application of the law.

"This is an expansive view of this notion of race-blind application of the law," said Eric Duncan, director of P-12 policy at EdTrust, which researches and advocates against racial inequities in education.

"This is not a legally backed policy change."

attribution · Eric Duncan

She said the guidance will ignore or threaten schools that try to keep students of color from being disproportionately excluded.

Adaku Onyeka-Crawford, director of the Opportunity to Learn program at the Advancement Project, a civil rights organization, said via email that the new guidance "will at best, ignore, or at worst, threaten schools that strive to ensure that Black, Indigenous and other students of color are not disproportionately deprived of educational opportunities by unfair or harsh discipline."

attribution · Adaku Onyeka-Crawford

Duncan said statistics show Black students are overly disciplined and excluded for minor offenses.

Onyeka-Crawford said the guidance is cruel and poorly argued, relying on unsupported assertions and misrepresentations of precedent.

"In addition to being cruel, today's guidance is poorly argued, relying on unsupported assertions, cherry-picked and out-of-context quotes, and misrepresentations of legal precedent," Onyeka-Crawford added.

attribution · Adaku Onyeka-Crawford

The letter was criticized by disparate-impact supporters and lauded by groups aligned with the Trump administration.

Duncan said the administration is signaling it will not go after districts whose codes have a disparate impact on minority students.

The Trump administration "is using this as an opportunity, as a signal, that they're not going to go after districts" that adopt discipline codes that have a disparate impact on minority students, Duncan said.

attribution · Eric Duncan

In that order Trump lambasted school discipline based on equity ideology.

Manhattan Institute fellow Carolyn Gorman called the letter very welcome common sense.

Gorman said making discipline conditional on things other than a student’s behavior makes outcomes harder to understand.

"Making discipline conditional on things other than an individual student's behavior makes it harder for students to understand what the outcome of their behavior is going to be," Gorman said in an interview.

attribution · Carolyn Gorman

Gorman said racial disparities may exist but poverty, family dynamics, and educational outcomes also play a role.

Gorman said it would be nice to put the disparate-impact debate to bed because schools are not helped by the whiplash.

As for the Trump administration's effort to declare the debate over on whether federal law permits the consideration of disparate-impact statistics, Gorman said, "It would be nice if this were put to bed because schools are not benefited by having to deal with this whiplash."

attribution · Carolyn Gorman

Richey said the Biden actions were met by confusion and issued against a backdrop of increasing school violence.

"Again, schools were pressured to collect, analyze, and adjust their disciplinary policies in light of racial disciplinary data," and "the Biden administration's actions were met by confusion," Richey said, and its "flawed understanding of Title VI was issued against a backdrop of increasing violence in schools."

attribution · Kimberly M. Richey

NPR

When is suspending students discrimination? Education Department renews an old fight

Cory Turner

25 Aug 2026

Facts

Mulford said Fayetteville got notice about two hours before it was named in the national release.

Federal data cited then said Black students were 15% of enrollment but 35% of students suspended once and 44% suspended more than once.

An APA task force found no evidence those disparities simply reflected differences in student behavior.

An American Psychological Association task force found no evidence that these disparities reflected differences in student behavior; instead, the APA said they "may be due to lack of teacher preparation in classroom management, lack of training in culturally competent practices, or racial stereotypes."

fact

Catherine Lhamon ran OCR under Presidents Obama and Biden.

Multiple federal investigations have found that discrimination still occurs in U.S. schools even though it has long been illegal.

After 2014 many districts shifted away from suspension and expulsion toward restorative justice and keeping students in school.

In the years after that 2014 guidance, NPR reported that many school districts mounted a dramatic shift away from suspension and expulsion and toward the use of policies that kept students in school, including restorative justice, which emphasizes dialogue and mediation over punishment.

fact

By 2018 the share of students suspended at least once had dropped from 5.6% to 4.7%.

Lhamon said the first desegregation agreements OCR was created to enforce required that discriminatory discipline practices end.

The guidance says the consideration of race in student discipline is race discrimination.

In late 2018 OCR reached an agreement with Wake County after finding Black students were more likely than similarly situated white students to be suspended for a first offense.

In late 2018, OCR reached an agreement with Wake County Public School System in North Carolina after finding that, among other things, Black students being disciplined for their first offense were more likely to be suspended than similarly situated white students.

fact

Hispanic students saw a 30% drop.

Black students and students with disabilities also saw drops, though their suspension rates remained high.

Enforcement of this policy continued into the first Trump administration.

The new guidance argues that under the previous policy, schools ignored or covered up misconduct to avoid racial-disparity statistics.

The latest guidance from the Trump administration argues that, under the previous policy, "schools ignored or covered up — rather than disciplined — student misconduct to avoid any purported racial disparity in discipline numbers that might catch the eye of the federal government. As a result, students who should have been suspended, expelled, or otherwise held accountable for dangerous or disruptive behavior remained in the classroom."

fact

Duncan said schools must be able to examine who is suspended or referred to law enforcement and whether students are treated differently for similar behavior.

"Schools must be able to examine who is being suspended, expelled, or referred to law enforcement, why those decisions are being made, and whether students are being treated differently for similar behavior," EdTrust's Eric Duncan said in a statement.

attribution · Eric Duncan

The backlash continued, fueled by a COVID-driven spike in student misbehavior.

Classroom discipline became a talking point in the 2024 presidential campaign.

Max Eden later worked in the second Trump administration.

A Milwaukee Public Schools spokesperson said the notice did not explain the reason for the investigation.

But, in response to a request for comment, a spokesperson for Milwaukee Public Schools said that the notice it had received from the Education Department didn't explain the reason for the investigation, and "Once we receive more detail, we would be able to respond appropriately."

attribution · Milwaukee Public Schools spokesperson

Mulford said his team does review the district’s discipline data.

Mulford is in his fourth year running Fayetteville.

Opinion

Mulford said the district is shocked and completely in the dark about what the investigation is about.

Mulford said Fayetteville has done extensive work to make its discipline policy consistent and unambiguous.

"The hardest part to swallow," Mulford says, is that "ever since I've been here, we've done extensive work around the consistency of our discipline policy … so that it takes away any ambiguity at all."

But, he adds, "we never talk about, 'Hey, go softer or harder on this particular group of people.' That doesn't even come into our language at all. So we preach consistency, the standard is the standard, everybody's held to the standard."

attribution · John Mulford

Mulford said that consistency work aligns with federal civil rights law.

Lhamon told NPR that not looking at discipline rates through race would have been an abdication.

Reflecting on why she sent that 2014 memo, Catherine Lhamon, who ran OCR under Presidents Obama and Biden, tells NPR that given our nation's history, not looking carefully at school discipline rates through the lens of race would have been an abdication.

attribution · Catherine Lhamon

Lhamon said discriminatory discipline is a feature of discrimination that has persisted in schools for decades.

The APA said disparities may be due to lack of teacher preparation, lack of culturally competent training, or racial stereotypes.

An American Psychological Association task force found no evidence that these disparities reflected differences in student behavior; instead, the APA said they "may be due to lack of teacher preparation in classroom management, lack of training in culturally competent practices, or racial stereotypes."

attribution · American Psychological Association

NPR asks whether a school policy that seems neutral can still discriminate through its impact.

But what if a school policy seems neutral — until you dig into its impact on students?

What if data shows that the policy is disproportionately hurting one group?

Is that also discrimination?

The new guidance and the Fayetteville investigation reopen an old and bitter civil rights fight over discipline in the nation's K-12 schools — and what qualifies as discrimination.

center · pluralist

Richey told NPR classrooms are less safe and more disruptive as a fruit of the prior policy, and that is why the department is ending it.

Conservative critics accused Lhamon of heavy-handedness after the 2014 guidance.

After the 2014 guidance, conservative critics accused Lhamon of heavy-handedness, arguing that districts began going easy on disruptive, perhaps dangerous students out of a fear that any difference in their discipline rates between student groups would be considered discrimination.

right · authoritarian

Eden wrote that kids should never again be put in danger because of statistics.

In 2018, conservative commentator Max Eden, who would go on to work in the second Trump administration, wrote that "school districts must never again be presumed guilty and unable to prove their innocence, and kids should never again be put in danger because of statistics."

attribution · Max Eden

Eden argued that relaxed discipline policies may also have made classrooms more disruptive.

Lhamon said the new guidance is a scare tactic designed to ensure some children experience extraordinary harm.

Duncan said that examination is not preferential treatment but basic accountability.

Lhamon argued that if schools cannot consider race, disparities will not go away.

Richey said considering race in discipline is not a tool of the law — it breaks the law.

Mulford said he welcomes the investigation and will fix anything it finds wrong.

Mulford says he welcomes the department and its investigation. If it finds something, he says, "Great. Share it with us. If we're doing something wrong, we'll get it fixed."

But, if they're looking for inconsistency, Mulford says, he doubts they'll find it in Fayetteville.

attribution · John Mulford