SBP:MCA: Understanding School Professionals Disciplinary Decisions and Black Children

被停学的儿童更有可能学业成绩较低，与刑事司法系统的接触增加。不幸的是，学龄前儿童休学的比率急剧上升。此外，学龄前停课的增加对黑人儿童产生了不成比例的影响。为了减少停学，科学家们需要更好地了解对黑人儿童和成人决策的看法是如何结合在一起影响受到这些纪律做法的学生数量的。候选人的中期职业发展(MCA)培训将对发展心理学、社会心理学和学校心理学领域的多学科研究产生直接影响，并促进科学理论和对人类行为与法律之间关系的理解。尽管司法部和美国教育部制定了关于学校纪律的政策声明，但学龄前儿童仍在使用停学。研究表明，大多数停职是由黑人儿童引起的。这一领域的大多数研究都是在学龄儿童中进行的；然而，在学龄前领域存在着显著的差距。因此，这个以归因和社会认知理论为基础的项目将包括：1)对这一领域的研究进行系统的回顾和文献计量分析；2)开发关于学龄前儿童行为的视频和小插曲；3)检查学龄前教师对学生的种族主义认知的程度和强度；以及4)与学龄前教师、职前教师和学前学校心理学家进行实地研究，以了解当他们建议停学时，他们是否考虑了儿童的当前行为和儿童的长期结果。与学校专业人员的这项工作将对社区产生重大影响，因为它有可能减少学龄前停课频率和减少从学校到监狱的管道。此外，通过这个MCA项目获得的知识将被用来开发干预措施，帮助学校专业人员减轻学龄前儿童的停学和开除。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Children who are suspended from school are more likely to have low academic achievement and increased contact with the criminal justice system. Unfortunately, rates of suspension in preschool have increased dramatically. Additionally, this rise in preschool suspensions has had a disproportionate impact on Black children. To decrease suspensions, scientists need a better understanding of how perceptions of Black children and adult decision-making combine to impact the number of students subject to these disciplinary practices. The candidate’s Mid-Career Advancement (MCA) training will have immediate impact on multidisciplinary research in the fields of developmental psychology, social psychology, and school psychology as well as advancing scientific theory and understanding of the connections between human behavior and law.Despite policy statements developed by the Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Education on school discipline, the use of suspensions in preschools continues to be used. Research indicates that a majority of these suspensions are incurred by Black children. A majority of research in this area has been conducted with school-aged children; however, a significant gap exists in the preschool domain. As such, this project, which is grounded in attribution and social cognitive theories will include: 1) conducting a systematic review and bibliometric analysis of research in this area; 2) developing videos and vignettes of preschool children’s’ behavior; 3) examining the degree and intensity of preschool teachers’ racialized perceptions of students; and 4) implementation of field research with preschool teachers, pre-service teachers, and pre-service school psychologists to understand if they consider the immediate behavior of the child and the long-term outcomes of children when they recommend suspension from preschool. This work with school-based professionals will have a significant impact on communities given that it has the potential to lessen preschool suspension frequencies and reduce the school-to-prison pipeline. Additionally, knowledge gained through this MCA project will be used to develop interventions to help school professionals to alleviate suspensions and expulsions in preschool-aged children.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.