More than 40% of all suspensions and about 10% of expulsions in California’s public schools are due to an offense known as “willful defiance.”
But what is willful defiance?

The California Education Code does not contain a clear definition of willful defiance, leaving school districts or even individual school employees to their own devices in determining the law’s scope.
There have been situations where students have faced severe disciplinary action over minor offenses. In one case, a student was sent home after being threatened with suspension for being defiant because he was not wearing his uniform shirt under a sweater after playing basketball. Situations like this are all too common in California and nationwide. The tens of thousands of suspensions in California each year over conduct that doesn't threaten personal safety reflect a systemic failure. These students are not falling through the cracks; rather they are shoved into them by overreaching policies and an ambiguous state law.
A handful of school districts like Los Angeles Unified School District have already implemented alternative disciplinary methods to suspension and expulsion. Such methods include a peer-led court, mediation, counseling and even in-school suspensions. But we are not living in the best of all possible worlds.
Until there is educational reform statewide, disproportionate discipline will affect the most vulnerable student populations.
However, with AB 420 there is hope. By limiting the ambiguity of willful defiance, AB 420 (Pupil discipline; suspensions; willful defiance) will reduce school pushout and protect the rights of all students, particularly those disproportionately affected like students of color, students with disabilities and LGBTQ students. So far, the State Assembly has passed AB 420 and is waiting to be brought up for a vote on the Senate floor.
There is much to be done to stop student pushout, and you can be a part of it. On August 14th at noon, the ACLU of California along with its coalition partners will be holding a rally on the north steps of the State Capitol in Sacramento to guarantee that the voices of students, parents, teachers and advocates are heard by our decision-makers.
Join the rally in support of this crucial education bill and let’s set the record straight: Every student deserves the chance to graduate.
Please e-mail jhernandez@aclu-sc.org for rally details.
Joey Hernández, @jhernandez2345, is Community Engagement and Policy Advocate at the ACLU of Southern California.

Twenty years ago, I attended my first gay Pride celebration in my hometown of Nashville, Tenn. It marked the beginning of my advocacy on behalf of the LGBTQ community -- and has informed all that I have done since. This is the work that drives me.
Over the past two decades, the tools I've used to enact change have evolved as I have continued my education. I began my career in the LGBTQ movement as the director of the organization that produced the Pride event in Nashville. But I soon learned the power of the law. City officials tried, time and again, to block the celebration. They increased the number of costly, off-duty police officers we had to hire to provide security. They demanded, the morning of the event one year, that we display documents proving that our tents were flame retardant. Every year but one, they refused to close the main street for our parade. When necessary, we threatened a lawsuit; and each time, our celebration proceeded.
I wanted to wield the power of the law for good. So I came here, to Loyola Law School, on a public interest scholarship. When I graduated a decade ago, many states still considered gays and lesbians criminals. Just months later, while I was studying for the bar exam, I witnessed the law serving as an agent of justice: In Lawrence v. Texas, the U.S. Supreme Court held that Texas's law -- which criminalized sexual acts between same-sex partners, but not partners of the opposite sex -- was unconstitutional.
It took another decade, but last month we once again witnessed the law's potential to expand -- not restrict -- our rights. Marriage for same-sex couples is now allowed in California, thanks to the Supreme Court's ruling in Hollingsworth v. Perry. On the same day, the Court ensured that married same-sex couples will receive federal benefits, by striking down a key part of the Defense of Marriage Act in Windsor v. United States, a lawsuit the ACLU filed with our courageous client Edie Windsor.
To me, these cases are why we go to law school. They show how essential legal tools are to safeguarding our rights. They show how we can use legal arguments to enact real, tangible change for those in our community. They show how, as lawyers, we can remain true to ourselves, to our passions.
The 10 years since I graduated from Loyola Law School have been defining ones in our fight for LGBTQ rights. The law has restored justice to California's marriage system. Roughly five years after the passage of Prop. 8, the Supreme Court's decision in the Perry lawsuit brought the freedom to marry back to the state. And in Windsor v. United States, a lawsuit has brought an end to the unequal federal benefits system, which deprived married same-sex couples of the federal benefits afforded married opposite-sex couples.
For me personally, the past decade has also been about self-knowledge, and learning how to remain true to my passions within my chosen career. Reflecting on this work, I'm reminded of why I chose the law as my profession, of why it's so important to have strong advocates who speak the language of the law.
I was born in 1970 - the same year that Pride began. Throughout my career, I have worked hard to remember that fact, to remember what I care about, and what I am working for.
James Gilliam is the Deputy Executive Director of the ACLU/SC; Cross-posted from Summary Judgements: The Loyola Law School, Los Angeles Faculty Blog