South Bend district kicks off data review of discipline disparities as community demands action under consent decree

Board Chair Stuart Green opened a community meeting of the South Bend Community School Corp and turned the presentation over to Peter Augustino, who said the district will conduct a data-driven review to test why disciplinary outcomes differ by race.

Augustino said internal record checks maintained by Dr. Yan and Dan Committa showed 84.2% consistency between code and practice for one earlier period and 90.5% consistency for the most recent school-year window he cited (August 2025–February 2026). He presented five example hypotheses for analysis — subjective infractions applied unevenly by race; higher referral rates tied to early-career or emergency-certified teachers; a correlation between low literacy and behavioral incidents; environmental or neighborhood triggers; and increased referrals when staff and student race do not match — and listed the data fields the district will need to cross-check (incident date/location, infraction category, police involvement, action taken, staff ID/race/experience/certification, student race/gender/age/literacy/IEP/ELL status and address).

Dr. Patrick Graff, a Notre Dame sociologist invited to speak, described national and Indiana research showing discipline disparities are multiply determined. He told the meeting that, in state-level data, roughly one in six Black elementary students receive exclusionary discipline each year and that relative rates of exclusionary discipline for Black students compared with white students often approach three times higher — consistent with national averages around 2.8–3.1x in recent federal data.

Members of the public pressed for faster implementation. Tiana Batiste Waddell, who said she presented a plan of action to the district last year, urged a holistic approach to data collection and repair under the federal consent decree and reported a recent allegation that a teacher had repeatedly referred to students as "little monkeys." Lori McGowan, who reviewed DOJ materials on the consent decree, asked who is accountable for ensuring compliance and requested transparency about a LEAP grant she said was "close to $22 million." Carrie Greve Dukes, a counseling student and substitute teacher, and other commenters urged culturally responsive training and restorative practices instead of retributive discipline.

Augustino and Chair Stuart Green summarized options for next steps: pursue the data analysis while simultaneously beginning targeted training and supports. Green said the board should publicly appoint a committee to guide the work; the meeting closed with that recommendation but without a recorded formal motion or vote at the public meeting.

The district said it will accept community hypotheses via blue sheets and will use descriptive analyses to locate "hot spots" (individual classrooms or teachers responsible for disproportionate referrals) that could be candidates for targeted coaching, mentoring, and policy review. The meeting did not record a formal vote or adoption of policy changes.