17. Internal Bias and Schools

Internal biases against children of color affects them significantly when they're being difficult in school, when they're doing excellent in school, and when they're committing crimes as youths.

Black children represent 18% of preschool enrollment, but 48% of preschool children receiving more than one out-of school suspension.

When they break a school rule (from chewing gum, to not wearing a proper uniform to fighting), children of color are more harshly punished than white children for the same offenses. Black girls, for instance, are six times more likely to be suspended for the same behavior as white girls.

When they are behaving and bright and full of potential, black students are about half as likely as white students to be put on a "gifted" track even when they have comparable test scores. A recent study by Jason Grissom and Christopher Redding at Vanderbilt University looked only at students attending schools with gifted programs. So the disparity can't be accounted for by, say, the fact that black students are more likely to attend under-resourced schools. They found that nonblack teachers identify black students as gifted in reading 2.1% of the time. Black teachers are three times more likely to identify black students as gifted in reading. That's the same rate for white students, no matter the race of their teacher.

In the criminal justice system, black juveniles who are first time offenders are more than six times as likely as whites to be sentenced by juvenile courts to prison. For those young people charged with a violent crime who have not been in juvenile prison previously, black teenagers are nine times more likely than whites to be sentenced to juvenile prison. For those charged with drug offenses, black youths are 48 times more likely than whites to be sentenced to juvenile prison.

Black boys are 18 times more likely to be tried as an adult than are white boys for the exact same offense.

Black violent juvenile offenders are given sentences an average of 61 days longer than whites. Hispanic offenders are given sentences an average 112 days longer than whites.

Reference:
http://www.nccdglobal.org/sites/default/files/publication_pdf/justice-for-some.pdf