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MCPS officials say serious-incident reporting is more accurate but racial suspension gaps persist; restorative-justice teams to expand
Summary
At a March 14 committee briefing, MCPS leaders said improved reporting and closing of incident records has raised confidence in data; they reported decreases in fights and overall suspensions but noted persistent racial disparities and described plans to expand restorative-justice teams and preventive services.
MCPS leaders told the Montgomery County Council Education and Culture Committee on March 14 that the district has tightened serious-incident reporting and improved closeout rates, but persistent racial disparities in suspensions remain a concern and restorative-justice efforts will be expanded.
"We've tightened our expectations on reporting serious incidents and made it very clear," Peter Moran, MCPS chief of schools, said during the presentation. He said the district is more confident in current counts and is pursuing more specific categorization so the public does not misinterpret aggregate figures.
Moran provided data showing a roughly 10% year-over-year decrease in fight-related serious incidents and a 1.5 percentage-point decrease in suspension rates overall as of the morning of the briefing. He cautioned that a large portion of the "other" serious-incident category consists of health emergencies (for students or staff) and maintenance incidents, and that the district plans to disaggregate those counts to provide clearer context.
Councilmembers pressed for discipline data that counts unique students rather than suspension events; Moran confirmed the current figures count suspensions and said the district can provide breakdowns showing how many individual students account for repeated suspensions. He described a change in suspension decisionmaking: rather than a single-person choice, suspension decisions now require a team process intended to reduce bias.
Moran and others highlighted restorative justice as a key strategy to reduce repeat incidents: the district will reassign restorative-justice specialists into cluster-level professional-learning roles and build cross-functional teams with smaller caseloads to provide more intensive, localized support. "Where we've stationed restorative justice staff, you see a much lower suspension rate," Moran said.
Councilmembers also discussed related preventive resources — school social workers, the Street Outreach Network and the Mobile Crisis Outreach Team — and asked MCPS to develop clearer protocols so those resources are used earlier and more consistently rather than only in crises. Committee members asked MCPS to supply weekly-tracking formats and further documentation on measures taken when disparities are detected at individual schools.
The committee requested follow-up materials including disaggregated incident counts, the planned reporting format for serious incidents, and metrics to evaluate restorative-justice teams' impact.
