Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools partners with Engaging Schools to address inequity

The impacts of COVID-19 on students and a national movement for racial justice are compelling many districts to explore ways they can implement supportive and restorative discipline practices as students readjust to in-person classrooms. NBC News covered the story in ‘Growing awareness’: Schools focus new policies on equity with students back in school.

One such district is the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools in North Carolina that began a partnership with Engaging Schools in spring 2021 to develop and implement a Code of Character, Conduct, and Support. According to the Winston-Salem Journal, between 2017-19 Black students were five times more likely than white students to get suspended and Black students with a disability were three times more likely to get suspended than other students with a disability.

“If we don’t do a systemwide overhaul through a lens of equity, if we don’t have buy-in from the  community, if we don’t have common language and standardized practices, we’ll continue to be in the same cycle over and over again” said Effie McMillian, the district’s executive director of equity, access, and acceleration. “What Engaging Schools can do for us is the heavy lift…and give us a real process that has been tried-and-true in other places so that we can develop a Code that can help us shift course from where we are right now.”

Engaging Schools is helping many other districts make these changes as well, with noteworthy results. One example is The Impact of Developing and Implementing a Code of Conduct, Character, and Support in the Syracuse City School District.