Classroom Disruptiveness and Racial, Ethnic, and Gender Disparities in Office Discipline Referrals

Prior research has shown that Black and Hispanic students are more likely to experience office discipline referrals than White youth, and the magnitude of these inequalities has been found to vary by gender. However, it remains unclear whether racial/ethnic and gender disparities in office referrals might be amplified among students in more disruptive classroom environments. Analyses of data from the 2012-2021 8th/10th grade cohorts of the Monitoring the Future survey (N = 70,442) reveal that, among male youth, Black- and Hispanic-White differences in office referrals are substantially weaker for students who describe their classrooms as more disruptive. In contrast, the heightened risk of an office referral for minority female students relative to White females increases in correspondence with higher levels of classroom disruptiveness.