This dissertation in practice was a Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) of Model School Policy 506, Student Discipline (MSBA, 2019), as it relates to the school-to-prison pipeline across the nation as well as in Minnesota. Model Policy 506, co-authored by the Minnesota School Board Association and the Minnesota Association of School Administrators, is offered to school districts that subscribe to MSBA’s policy services. The homogeneity in school discipline policy across Minnesota provided an opportunity for this study. The purpose of this CDA was two-fold: to assess the discourses instantiated in Model School Policy 506, and to determine, through the figured world tool of inquiry, what the seven building tasks are accomplishing in Model Policy 506 for the reader to assume as social truth regarding student behavior and schooling. Data was collected through an iterative process and examined for themes. The CDA included multiple reviews of Model Policy 506 through the figured world tool of inquiry (Gee 2014), discerning and charting of the activities of the seven building tasks (Gee, 2014), assessing text complexity of policy discourse through a Lexile review, and capturing word repetition via computerized software as well as noting infrequent use of terms or absence of ideas. Major findings include that Model Policy 506, Student Discipline, acted to reinscribe teacher implicit bias, and that policy language was invested and embedded in racial structures. A Call to Action was written to be shared with the executive directors of the Minnesota School Board Association and the Minnesota Association of School administrators as an actionable response to the complex issue of social justice in discipline policy.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ndsu.edu/oai:library.ndsu.edu:10365/32297 |
| Date | January 2020 |
| Creators | Uselman, Tamara |
| Publisher | North Dakota State University |
| Source Sets | North Dakota State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | NDSU policy 190.6.2, https://www.ndsu.edu/fileadmin/policy/190.pdf |
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