Requested Information
Number of times students have been suspended (in school or out of school) for each high school for posting information on the internet for each of the past 3 academic years including this year. For each offense, platform of post (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, petition), reason given for violation, date of suspension, and punishment.
Status
Complete
Responsive Documents
Categories for suspension infraction type that HCPSS currently collects as required by the State can be found on page 5 – there is not one specific place that incidents related to online posts would be recorded/tracked. While most are likely recorded in Other, depending on the nature of the post they could also fall under Threats, etc.
Including data from existing reports on in-school suspensions, by violation and school. indicated above, categories for in-school suspension infraction types do not specifically include online posts and may be recorded under bullying, threats, etc. depending on the nature of the post and other factors that lead to the suspension. Please note the data parameters contained in the attached chart. Under both the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (FERPA), which restricts access to student records, and MPIA GP § 4-313, which prevents disclosure of school district records pertaining to individual students, HCPSS must protect against the potential disclosures of personally identifiable information about students. In accordance, HCPSS follows the Maryland State Department of Education and the National Center for Education Statistics’ guidelines for protecting student privacy in public reporting and suppresses the following from responsive records: counts that fall below 10; percentages that are less than or equal to 5, or greater than or equal to 95; categories directly related to specific student records; and/or information that, when combined with other publicly accessible data, can reasonably identify an individual student or reveals information from an individual student’s record. HCPSS has made substantial efforts to ensure the accuracy of this information; however, data collection and reporting is consistently subject to change. Please be mindful when comparing data as many variances can occur between reports based on date pulled, parameters used, categories included, etc.