PhiladelphiaDiscipline & climatemedium
Where Philly's chronic-suspension tail moved 2019-20 to 2024-25
Thesis
SDP publishes 6 years of OSS distribution data (2019-20 through 2024-25). The chronic-tail (4+ suspensions per year) at the schools currently leading the list is likely the inverse of citywide policy — Philly's discipline reforms post-2020 reduced suspensions citywide, but specific schools maintain (or expanded) the heavy tail. This story tracks which.
Supporting findings
- 6 years of distribution data per school: 2019-20, 2020-21 (COVID year, suspensions near zero), 2021-22, 2022-23, 2023-24, 2024-25.
- Grover Washington Jr MS, Strawberry Mansion HS, Murrell Dobbins HS are the top three in 2024-25 — were they top in 2019-20 too?
- COVID year (2020-21) is essentially zero discipline action across the board — analytically a missing year.
- Compare top-tail trajectory with system-wide median OSS rate.
Reporting directions
- Time-series plot per top-tail school.
- Match each top-tail school to a peer-set school NOT in the top tail at similar demographics. What's different at the principal level?
- Compare to NYC's missing data: same metric NYC doesn't publish; Philly does.
Methodology & replication recipe — the queries + sources behind the findings above.