Arkansas — school discipline

The published process

Notice and hearing before exclusion

The rules assign the procedure to district policy rather than stating it themselves: student discipline policies shall "Establish procedures for notice to students and parents of charges, hearings, and other due process proceedings to be applicable in the enforcement and administration of such policies by the school administrator and by the school board of directors". (Rules 5.04.3) The rules do state one immediate step: "Upon suspension of a student, the school shall immediately contact the student's parent or legal guardian to notify the parent or legal guardian of the suspension." (Rules 5.17) That notice may be made by "Direct contact with the parent or legal guardian at the primary call number or in person", "Leaving a voice mail at the primary call number", "Sending a text message to the primary call number", "Email if the school is unable to make contact through the primary call number", or "Regular first-class mail if the school is unable to make contact through the primary call number or email." (Rules 5.17.2.1–.5) "The school shall keep a notification log of contacts attempted and made to the parent or legal guardian." (Rules 5.17.3)

Services during exclusion

Student discipline policies shall "Include programs, measures, or alternative means and methods to continue student engagement and access to education during periods of suspension or expulsion". (Rules 5.04.9) For an expelled student specifically: "A public school district or open-enrollment public charter school that expels a student, shall offer to the expelled public school student digital learning courses or other alternative educational courses for which the student may receive academic credit that is at least equal to credit the expelled public school student may have received if he or she was still enrolled in his or her assigned public school or open-enrollment public charter school immediately before he or she was expelled." (Rules 5.18)

The record made, and the appeal route

A teacher's or administrator's suspension is "subject to appeal to the superintendent or his or her designee." (Rules 5.14) "If the superintendent initiates the suspension process, the decision may be appealed to the board of directors." (Rules 5.15) A superintendent-recommended expulsion is "subject to appeal to the board of directors and to requirements of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, 20 U.S.C. § 1401 et seq." (Rules 5.16) "After hearing all testimony and debate on a suspension, expulsion, or appeal, the board of directors may consider its decision in executive session without the presence of anyone other than the board members." And "At the conclusion of an executive session, the board of directors shall reconvene in public session to vote on the suspension, expulsion, or appeal." (Rules 5.16.1, 5.16.2) An appeal hearing runs the same way, and at the parent's request: "A school district board meeting entertaining an appeal shall be conducted in executive session if requested by the parent or guardian of the student provided that after hearing all testimony and debate, the board of directors shall conclude the executive session and reconvene in public session to vote on such appeal." (Rules 5.16.3) For a firearm or prohibited-weapon expulsion, "The expulsion shall be noted on the student's permanent school record." (Rules 5.19.1) No forum beyond the local board appears in the sources reviewed.

If the student has an IEP or Section 504 plan

The disability layer lives on this site's Arkansas special education page. The rules themselves tie an expulsion recommendation "to requirements of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, 20 U.S.C. § 1401 et seq." (Rules 5.16)

The four rows above answer the questions an experienced adviser raises first, from the state's own rules, or record that a question is not answered in them.

Timelines, as stated in the sources

All quoted; none calculated. From the DESE Rules Governing Student Discipline and School Safety as retrieved Sep 8, 2026.

On the suspension line: "dismissal from school for a period of time that does not exceed ten (10) days" is a suspension; beyond that it is an expulsion. (Rules 4.10, 4.06)

On the maximum suspension a teacher or administrator may impose: "a maximum of ten (10) school days". (Rules 5.14)

On the mandatory firearm-expulsion period: "expulsion from school for a period of one (1) year for possession of any firearm or other weapon prohibited upon the school campus by law," subject to the superintendent's case-by-case discretion to modify it. (Rules 5.04.2)

On the Division report after a firearm or weapon expulsion: the principal "shall report, within a week, to the Division". (Rules 5.19)

On amendments to a district's discipline policy: they must be "submitted to the Division within thirty (30) days after the adoption of such amendment or revision." (Rules 5.08)

On bullying investigations: "The investigation shall be completed as soon as possible but not later than five (5) school days from the date of the written report of the alleged incident of bullying." (Rules 6.10.2.1) A parent or guardian of a student who is the victim or perpetrator "is entitled within five (5) school days after the completion of the investigation, and in accordance with federal and state law, to receive information about the investigation". (Rules 6.10.3.3)

What any of this means for a particular situation is for the district and the agency to determine.

Assigned to district policy by the quoted provision

The rules write the frame and expressly hand much of the detail to each district's board. Each entry below is a question a district's own discipline policy answers, with the delegating text quoted. No district's discipline policy or handbook is captured or quoted here.

The notice and hearing procedure itself. Student discipline policies shall "Establish procedures for notice to students and parents of charges, hearings, and other due process proceedings to be applicable in the enforcement and administration of such policies by the school administrator and by the school board of directors". (Rules 5.04.3)

The penalties for each offense. Student discipline policies shall "Prescribe minimum and maximum penalties, including without limitation, students’ suspension or expulsion from school, for violations of any of the offenses listed in 5.03 above, and for violations of other practices prohibited by school discipline policies". (Rules 5.04.1) The rule adds that the superintendent has discretion to modify a prescribed penalty for a student case by case.

Services during suspension or expulsion. Student discipline policies shall "Include programs, measures, or alternative means and methods to continue student engagement and access to education during periods of suspension or expulsion". (Rules 5.04.9)

Whether corporal punishment is used at all, and how. "A school district that authorizes the use of corporal punishment in its discipline policy shall include provisions for administration of the punishment". (Rules 5.21)

The anti-bullying policy's content. "Each public school district board of directors shall adopt policies to prevent bullying." The rules require the resulting policy to include stated minimum elements. (Rules 6.02)

Personal electronic device rules. "A school district may establish a written student discipline policy and exemptions concerning the possession and use by a student of a personal electronic device". (Rules 5.05)

Whether an expelled student from another district may enroll before the expulsion period ends. "The board of directors of a school district may adopt a policy that any person who has been expelled as a student from any other school district may not enroll as a student until the time of the student's expulsion has expired, provided that the receiving school district board affords the student the opportunity for a hearing at the time the student is seeking enrollment." (Rules 5.20)

Records access, as stated in the sources

The rules state what is recorded rather than a right of parent inspection or expungement: for a firearm or prohibited-weapon expulsion, "The expulsion shall be noted on the student's permanent school record." (Rules 5.19.1) The Division separately "shall maintain information regarding students who are expelled for possessing a firearm or other prohibited weapon on school property or for committing other acts of violence." (Rules 5.19.3) A public school "shall indicate on a student's attendance record if a student's absence is the result of an out-of-school suspension." (Rules 5.17.4) Inspection, copies, or expungement of discipline records by a parent: not stated in the sources reviewed. Federal records rights under FERPA are not restated here.

Change log

Sep 8, 2026 · Deepened to full page (discipline-layer deepening pass). Recaptured first-party under recipe tools/recipes/arkansas-discipline.json: the DESE Rules Governing Student Discipline and School Safety, and the agency's Student Discipline Policies and Handbooks page. The recapture reproduced the Aug 30, 2026 baseline's source text unchanged; retained as confirmed. Built out sections 01–02 (framework, hoisted rows, timelines), the district delegation map, and records access from the same two sources captured for the baseline; no new sources were fetched, consistent with this pass's instruction not to widen an existing recipe. Findings recorded: (1) the notice-and-hearing procedure a family will meet is delegated to district policy by Rule 5.04.3, while the rules themselves state one immediate parent-notification step (Rule 5.17) and its permitted contact methods; (2) services during exclusion combine a stated element (digital learning courses offered to an expelled student under Rule 5.18) and a delegated one (district programs under Rule 5.04.9); (3) the appeal route runs teacher/administrator suspension → superintendent, and superintendent-initiated suspension or recommended expulsion → board of directors, each stated with its executive-session procedure; no forum beyond the local board appears in the sources; (4) the agency's own compliance-summary page names a program contact (Alex Pritchett) for discipline-policy filing questions, which the docket now records as a policy-compliance contact distinct from a state appeal forum — a correction to the baseline's blanket statement that no state office appears in the sources, which the second captured source (fetched for the baseline but not reflected in that page's docket row) in fact contains; (5) records access is thin: the rules state what gets noted on a record (a firearm/weapon expulsion, an out-of-school-suspension absence) and what the Division itself maintains, but state no parent right of inspection, copying, or expungement, which is recorded as not stated; (6) two sources remain identified but uncaptured: the Arkansas Code sections the rules implement (not published in full text by the Legislature) and the Code of Arkansas Rules' own view of Part 234 (client-rendered, returned no text). Internet Archive captures: to be added. Reviewer: Carrie Schluter. Corrections on the record in this log: hello@fieldassembly.net.

Aug 30, 2026 · Baseline page created (discipline-layer breadth sprint). Captured first-party under recipe tools/recipes/arkansas-discipline.json: the DESE Rules Governing Student Discipline and School Safety, and the agency's Student Discipline Policies and Handbooks page. Findings recorded: (1) the Legislature does not publish the Arkansas Code's text on arkleg.state.ar.us — its "Arkansas Code" control opens an external-link dialog to a commercial publisher — so the state's fullest first-party statement of the discipline scheme is the State Board's rule, which recites the code sections it implements; the statutes themselves are listed as capture pending rather than quoted from a non-state host; (2) the state draws its line at ten days and defines both suspension and expulsion by it, and pairs each side of the line with a different appeal forum — the superintendent below it, the board of directors above; (3) two removals are prohibited outright, out-of-school suspension for truancy and out-of-school suspension or expulsion in K-5 except for stated behavior; (4) the notice-and-hearing procedure is assigned to district policy by rule 5.04.3, which requires that districts establish it — a delegation, not an absence, and the entry that will anchor the full page's delegation map; (5) the rules as published number two different definitions 4.06, "Expulsion" and "Harassment"; both are quoted as printed and nothing is reconciled; (6) no state-level appeal forum or parent contact appears in the sources. Capture note: dese.ade.arkansas.gov serves its leaf certificate without the Sectigo intermediate that signs it, so both sources are fetched against a pinned bundle in tools/certs/ rather than the system store; the bundle narrows trust rather than widening it, and verification still happens. The Code of Arkansas Rules view of the same rule is client-rendered and returned no text to this capture; it is listed as pending. Internet Archive captures: to be added. Reviewer: Carrie Schluter, reviewed 2026-08-30. Corrections on the record in this log: hello@fieldassembly.net.

Oct 6, 2026 · Internet Archive captures recorded. Captures requested on 2026-09-06 by an automated capture pass and recorded this date; no human review is claimed for this entry. No quotation, date, finding or link above was changed by it. Each capture below was requested through Save Page Now and then confirmed to play back. Captures added: dese.ade.arkansas.gov → https://web.archive.org/web/20260906123638/https://dese.ade.arkansas.gov/Offices/public-school-accountability/compliance-assistance-center/student-discipline-policies-and-handbooks. Corrections on the record in this log: hello@fieldassembly.net.