Every year, Texas sends out more than 100,000 trainees to its system of disciplinary schools, called disciplinary alternative education programs. When the state legislature established DAEPs in 1995, during rising national concern about school violence, they were created as a step up from a suspension for trainees who ‘d devoted major offenses.
However ever since, the state legislature has actually slowly expanded the reasons why a student can– or need to– be sent out to a DAEP, according to a Hechinger Report examination. Today, students are sent out to the schools, for weeks or sometimes months at a time, for offenses consisting of vaping, making risks, bringing a weapon to school or getting in difficulty with police off campus.
Educators state alternative schools are an essential tool for dealing with severe trainee misdeed and keeping teachers and other students safe. But critics state there’s insufficient oversight of how the schools work and why students end up in them. They likewise question the quality of education trainees receive while in DAEPs.
Our examination into these schools revealed:
Students can be sent to DAEPs for minor habits. A review of records from dozens of school districts showed that trainees have actually been sent to DAEPs for offenses like insubordination, participation problems, gown code offenses and profanity.
Those misdeeds are not clearly listed in state law as reasons to send a trainee to alternative programs. However districts can use their discretion for any behavior that violates their regional code of conduct. In the 2024-25 school year, for example, nearly 36,000 DAEP placements were made due to the fact that of code of conduct infractions, compared to under 12,000 for attack.
Critics state the legislature took a step toward codifying this method into law in 2015 when it passed a bill clearly enabling districts to send out kids to DAEPs for disturbances.
Households are rarely successful in reversing DAEP placements. State law requires that before a trainee is sent to a DAEP, a hearing must be held to weigh the proof and mitigating elements. The hearing is managed by the school district, though, rather than a neutral celebration, and a district staff member makes the last determination.
Households do not always have a right to appeal to district leaders or the school board. The law also does not offer a course to raise a complaint to the Texas Education Company; courts, on the other hand, have actually traditionally ruled they do not have jurisdiction in this area.
DAEPs tend to be very strict environments, and many students struggle in them. Students in these programs are often forbidden from speaking in class unless given approval, according to our analysis of handbooks from 75 districts. When moving from class to class, they are generally required to stroll in a single-file line– in some cases even with their hands behind their back. Strict dress codes ban facial hair, precious jewelry and shoes. Additional days can be contributed to a placement if a trainee breaks any guidelines.
Because students in different courses and grades cycle in and out of DAEPs throughout the year, the majority of schoolwork is done independently, often on computers. For students with long positionings, this can mean going months without live direction. Research recommends that trainees appointed to DAEPs are less most likely to finish from high school on time; only 44 percent of ninth graders put in a DAEP finished four years later on, compared to 84 percent of trainees who received no discipline and 70 percent who had been assigned one in-school suspension.
Some student groups are overrepresented in DAEPs. In the 2024-25 academic year, Black trainees made up about 13 percent of the general student body in Texas, but represented 22 percent of all students put in DAEPs. Males also are appointed this punishment at a greater rate than females, representing about two-thirds of all positionings.
State law needs educators to consider a trainee’s impairment status before sending a trainee to an alternative school. Nevertheless, students in special education comprised nearly a quarter of such positionings, in spite of only representing 17 percent of the total trainee population. When in a DAEP, students can get days added to their placement if they do not follow all the school guidelines. Professionals say that students with impairments frequently have a tough time with the stiff structure and wind up remaining longer.
Read the complete story.
Share your experiences with school discipline with us at [email protected].
Contact examinations editor Sarah Butrymowicz at [email protected] or on Signal: @sbutry.04.
This story about DAEP schools was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization concentrated on inequality and development in education. Sign up for the Hechinger newsletter.
Was this story valuable? Leave a tip to support your education reporters.
The Hechinger Report is a not-for-profit newsroom powered by reader assistance
Republish our posts totally free, online or in print, under an Innovative Commons license.