Discipline in Brevard schools: What did audit reveal?
In November 2022, newly elected Brevard School Board Chair Matt Susin stood outside the Brevard County Jail with Sheriff Wayne Ivey. Together they declared a “brand new day” for discipline in Brevard schools.
With mounting tension brought by the COVID-19 pandemic, legislation restricting what could and couldn’t be taught in class and teacher retention issues, bad behavior by students and a feeling of a lack of support were reaching a tipping point among BPS staff.
Though Susin promised the “most prolific policy the school district’s ever had,” what followed in the months after the video was far less dramatic. In January, an audit of discipline in the 74,300-student district commenced, headed by auditor RSM. It aimed to examine the discipline processes within BPS and offer suggestions as to how to address behaviors that were disrupting classroom learning.
On Monday, the district released the auditor’s 87-page report that showed Brevard’s discipline issues aren’t so different from those of surrounding districts.
It revealed that when compared to data collected over the course of four years from Osceola County, Volusia County, Lee County, Seminole County and Orange County, Brevard fell somewhere in the middle.
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Brevard’s average types of incidents compared to other districts also varied, with some — like tobacco possession or use — coming in at 9.02 incidents per 1,000 full-time equivalent student, while comparable districts reported an average of 5.12 per 1,000. Other areas addressed saw much lower numbers, such as the threat/intimidation and alcohol categories, with Brevard reporting fewer than one incident per 1,000 full-time equivalent student, while comparable districts reported 3.62 and 3.47 respectively.
Though the audit highlighted multiple issues, the main problem boiled down to a lack of a centralized office that handles discipline. Instead, responsibility rests on teachers, principals and administrators.
This can create confusion and room for mistakes, said Sue Hann, acting superintendent.
“A lot of what came out of the audit was really about some of our own internal processes and monitoring and those types of things that are not necessarily specific to the discipline itself, but they’re more specific to how we manage the discipline process, responsibility for monitoring discipline process and making sure that we are actually getting the results from our discipline process,” she said.
There wasn’t a big major "aha!" moment in the audit, but instead a focus on the smaller issues of reporting discipline problems, correctly classifying discipline behaviors and creating a better environment for staff and students.
There are five disciplinary levels at BPS, which classify different behaviors based on their severity and the potential threat they pose to students or others within the district.
School staff are required to report behaviors through the School Environment Safety Incident Reporting software, an incident reporting system that establishes 26 behavior codes to be reported to Florida Department of Education. If a behavior violates BPS’ code of conduct but doesn’t qualify as a SESIR-defined behavior, it is to be reported through locally defined behavior codes.
“This is a process that involves a lot of people doing a lot of different things in a software system that’s not perfect with … a number of discipline categories, and then there’s a number of different corrective actions,” Hann said, adding that there were many moving parts.
To make their report, the auditors focused on both SESIR behaviors and locally defined behaviors. Their report mainly focused on the first semester of the 2022-2023 year, though they drew from previous years’ data in comparisons between Brevard County and similar districts.
Here's what the audit found
During the first semester of the 2022-2023 year, the audit found:
680 SESIR incidents for general education students, with 57% of these occurring at the high school level and about 374 of those incidents being categorized as tobacco possession and/or use.
335 SESIR incidents for ESE students, with about 45% of the incidents occurring at the high school level. 160 of the reported incidents were classified as tobacco possession and/or use.
18,772 locally defined incidents among general education students, with 40% occurring at the high school level. The most reported behavior, at approximately 2,918 times, was students being out of their assigned area, followed by willful disobedience/insubordination reported 2,897 times.
9,739 locally defined incidents among ESE students with 1,750 reported instances of willful disobedience/insubordination, followed by 1,414 reports of being out of assigned area.
What's next?
It will be up to the school board to decide what to do with the report. At this point, no steps will be taken until the board is presented with the findings at a meeting 9 a.m. Wednesday.
Through controversy around BPS’ discipline policy arose in December following the jailhouse video, Susin said he’d initially raised the issue of a discipline audit two years ago. At the time, it was put off due to more pressing issues.
On Monday, Susin said the audit pointed to the need for parents to do more.
A survey conducted among teachers, administrators and bus drivers revealed many do not feel that parents or students understand policies, or that they will cooperate with them.
Additionally, many said their safety had been threatened by students.
“We can’t move this needle without the parents,” Susin said. “If we can’t educate the parents, we’re going to end up in a bad spot.”
Hann agreed, adding that making schools safer will be a collaborative effort.
“We do need to do a better job of training,” she said. “We do need to do a better job of bringing our stakeholders together. That includes our parents and our students — our parents and students need to know the impact of behavior on the learning environments. So we’ve got to do a much better job getting all that information out.”
The main problem the audit pointed to was in how problem behaviors were reported, with BPS staff incorrectly classifying behaviors, recording the wrong dates incidents occurred and entering the wrong consequence for the action.
Hann said she wants to create a centralized group for discipline.
“I think one of the recommendations, where we set up a sort of discipline group that has a cabinet-level position makes sense," Hann said.
Susin agreed that the development of a discipline group would be beneficial. He added that improving things in the district would be a collaborative effort.
“We don’t want to create a situation where we’re trying to go hunt people who didn’t fill out their proper things,” he said. “I think the responsibility falls on us as a district and school board to make sure that we make those people feel good — that’s our thing, like let’s get to work, let’s get this thing moving. We don’t have time to turn around and say, ‘You’re wrong, you’re wrong, you’re wrong,’ because ultimately, everybody owns a part of this — parents, students, everybody.”
Finch Walker is the education reporter at FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Walker at 321-290-4744 or fwalker@floridatoday.com. Twitter: @_finchwalker.
This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Brevard Public Schools discipline audit: What did it reveal?
