In a public school paradox, New York City student suspensions have dropped in the first half of the school year while felony assaults have surged.
New Department of Education data shows 9,193 suspensions from July through December 2025 — 8.3% less than the same period the previous year — but 109 serious assaults, up 5% from the 103 in 2024.
The most severe form of discipline, a so-called superintendent’s suspension — which last six days or longer and are served in facilities outside of school — plunged even further. There were 1,608 superintendent suspensions in the last six months of 2025, 21.6% down from the 2,052 issued in the period in 2024.
City educrats pointed to restorative justice practices for the decrease.
“Across the system, schools are increasingly using restorative practices, peer mediation, in-school counseling, and referrals to external mental health providers to respond to student needs, helping keep students engaged in their learning while maintaining safe school communities,” a DOE spokesperson said.
But restorative justice is a controversial alternative to strict discipline that is geared towards mediation and conflict resolution. In some forms, violent and problem pupils sit in harm-reduction “circles” with teachers and their victims.
Critics say fewer suspensions and restorative justice programs is a woke band-aid that offers little long-term change in bad student behavior.
“Restorative justice is masking the broader behavioral issues because that’s discouraging consequences altogether,” Manhattan Institute education behavioral researcher Jennifer Weber said. “Restorative justice hasn’t been shown to be effective, it hasn’t shown to affect a student’s behavior.”
Brooklyn Citywide Council on High Schools member Linda Quarles was also troubled by the new system.
“If I say I don’t want to face my bully, I become the problem. Nothing happens.” she said. “They use this as a way of completely reframing of what’s suspendable.”
NYC has spent upwards of $100 million on restorative justice practices since 2015, according to a Manhattan Institute study authored by Weber.
Weber pointed out that Big Apple schools are facing an enrollment and chronic absenteeism crisis, and fewer students means fewer suspensions.
“The suspension measure is such a bad measure in looking at overall behavior, because suspensions have been discouraged, and the decision is ultimately made by school administrators,” Weber said.
Despire assaults being up, most crimes were down in city school, police data showed.
The seven major index crimes monitored by the NYPD — murder, rape, robbery, felony assault, burglary, grand larceny, and auto theft — declined to 264 in school for the first half of the school year, down from 290 over the same period the year before, according to police data.
There were 707 fewer weapons recovered in schools in the first half of the school year compared to the same period the year before, with 3,487 recovered, police sources said.