WRDSB suspensions decrease; violent incidents jump 30 per cent

A new detailed report from the Waterloo Region District School Board (WRDSB) shows less students were suspended during the 2023-2024 school year than the year prior.

However, the number of violent incidents increased from 62 to 81 over the same time period.

The report shows that 2,524 suspensions were handed out during the 2023-2024, a decrease from the 2,716 suspensions seen during the 2022-2023 school year. WRDSB had 65,885 students enrolled in their schools, with a 3.8 per cent suspension rate.

The majority of students that were suspended were male (71 per cent) and most of them were three days or less (85.5 per cent). Grade 9 students saw the most suspensions with 318.

Bill Lemon, the superintendent of student achievement and well-being at WRDSB, said that staff are pleased with the decreases, but there is still a lot of work to be done.

“We are committed to pursuing alternatives to out of school suspension and working to develop learning programs, in particularly social problem solving programs and moving those programs upstream as possible,” he said.

The most suspensions were due to code of conduct violations (968), followed by fighting (760) and then opposition to authority (296). The number of 20-day suspensions also increased to 71 from 47 from the year before.

The top three most common places were suspension behaviour took place was in the classroom, the school grounds and the hallway.

So far this year, the number of suspensions in both elementary and secondary school have gone down compared to October 2023. In elementary schools, 162 suspensions have been enforced compared to the 188 from last year. In secondary school, 258 suspensions have been enforced versus the 310 seen last year.