Table 5.
Multilevel Analysis of Children’s School Absence and School Suspension
| Child- and school-level factors | Mean Monthly School Absence | In-School or Out-of School Suspension (Yes=1) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
| ||||||
| Exponentiated estimate | P-level | Odds Ratio | 95% Limits | Confidence | P-level | |
| School Year (Ref. group = STS enrollment year) | ||||||
| One year pre-enrollment | 0.92 | 0.092 | 0.67 | 0.53 | 0.85 | 0.001 |
| One year Post-enrollment | 1.01 | 0.871 | 0.60 | 0.47 | 0.76 | <.001 |
| Gender (Ref. group = Female) | ||||||
| Male | 1.07 | 0.195 | 1.41 | 1.08 | 1.85 | 0.011 |
| Race/Ethnicity (Ref. group = White) | ||||||
| African American | 0.91 | 0.192 | 1.47 | 0.98 | 2.21 | 0.060 |
| Hispanic | 0.99 | 0.932 | 1.25 | 0.79 | 1.99 | 0.339 |
| Other | 0.95 | 0.799 | 1.33 | 0.49 | 3.62 | 0.573 |
| Behavioral health disorder (Ref. group = Other disorders) | ||||||
| ADHD | 0.89 | 0.048 | 0.99 | 0.73 | 1.34 | 0.954 |
| Conduct disorder/ODD | 0.94 | 0.347 | 1.27 | 0.92 | 1.75 | 0.147 |
| Grade level: 6th–8th grades (ref. group = 1st – 6th grades) | 1.23 | <.001 | 1.95 | 1.55 | 2.47 | <.001 |
| One or more annual school transfers (Ref. group = no school transfer) | 1.56 | <.001 | 1.57 | 1.22 | 2.01 | 0.000 |
| School-level absence in quartile categories (Ref. group = Lowest 25%) | ||||||
| Monthly school-absence level: Top 25% | 1.62 | <.001 | NA | NA | NA | NA |
| Monthly school-absence level: Upper 2nd quarter | 1.30 | <.001 | NA | NA | NA | NA |
| Monthly school-absence level Lower 2nd quarter | 1.18 | 0.006 | NA | NA | NA | NA |
| School-level suspension in quartile categories (Ref. group = Lowest 25%) | ||||||
| Monthly school-suspension level: Top 25% | NA | NA | 3.12 | 2.26 | 4.30 | <.001 |
| Monthly school-suspension level: Upper 2nd quarter | NA | NA | 2.41 | 1.78 | 3.27 | <.001 |
| Monthly school-suspension level: Lower 2nd quarter | NA | NA | 1.79 | 1.33 | 2.42 | 0.000 |
| More than 4 psychiatric outpatient visits during a school year (Yes=1) | 0.90 | 0.043 | 1.00 | 0.77 | 1.31 | 0.983 |
| More than 15 times of BHRS service use during a school year (Yes=1) | 0.92 | 0.115 | 1.02 | 0.79 | 1.31 | 0.900 |
|
| ||||||
| Random effect: Within-person variance over time | 0.85(0.03) | 0.42(0.11) | ||||
| Goodness-of-fit | ||||||
| −2 Res Log Pseudo-Likelihood | 5576.99 | 8545.92 | ||||
Note. STS: School Therapeutic Services, The school absence model included children’s monthly absence as the dependent variable. The school suspension model examined the probability of having annual in- or out-of-school suspension (recoded as a binary dependent variable suspended =1 vs. not suspended=0). NA: Not applicable.