MINNEAPOLIS — Heightened concerns over student misbehavior, including assaults on school staff members, could lead to a partial rollback of Minnesota’s ban on suspending students in grades K-3.

At Ramsey Elementary in the Anoka-Hennepin School District, a third-grader punched Principal Denise Schnabel in the face, breaking her glasses and cutting her nose, and a second-grader tossed and broke apart furniture, requiring an entire wing of the building to be shut down.

Altogether, 142 classrooms in kindergarten through third grade in the state’s largest school district, have been cleared in 2025-26 due to students threatening the safety of others — a year after Anoka-Hennepin posted a three-year high of 304 elementary classroom evacuations.

“There is a common misconception that, at the elementary level, little people have little problems,” Schnabel told a state Senate panel recently.

Suspensions are not a cure, she said, but they are “an essential tool for safety and stabilization.”

On Wednesday, March 25, state Sen. Jim Abeler, R-Anoka, inserted into the Senate’s education policy bill a return of one-day suspensions for the state’s youngest students. But in a compromise with anti-suspension student advocates, he agreed the action could be taken only in instances of serious injuries or the potential of serious injuries.

He said he knew of a pregnant teacher who had been punched in the stomach by a student.

The suspension ban was approved in 2023 and was a major win for advocates who long have pointed to suspensions’ disproportionate impact on minority students. They cite a state Department of Human Rights report showing Black students were eight times more likely than white students to be suspended and disabled students were twice as likely as their nondisabled counterparts.

“I’ve been very hopeful that student discipline wouldn’t have been a hot topic [at the State Capitol] this year,” said Erin Sandsmark, who leads the group Solutions Not Suspensions. “I’m disappointed with the partial repeal, instead of student supports. Alas, we are here.”

Abeler’s bill calls for schools to meet with teachers, parents, counselors and, if applicable, special-education staff members, after a student is suspended a second time. They will identify underlying factors and take corrective steps.

Across Minnesota, however, school support staff members central to such discussions are being targeted for layoffs as districts — Anoka-Hennepin and Minneapolis among them — cut their 2026-27 budgets.

Minneapolis and Anoka-Hennepin are proposing to eliminate counselor positions. But Anoka-Hennepin plans to have a social worker at every elementary school. Minneapolis, too, is seeking to clarify with Abeler that social workers can step in for any suspension-related meetings.

Student-on-staff violence can be tough to track. Injury data kept by districts for workers’ compensation purposes, for example, can include incidents in which a student strikes or bites a teacher, but also when a teacher collides with a colleague in the hallway or trips and sprains an ankle.

The Minnesota Department of Education posts statewide numbers documenting assaults on school employees by students, but there is a two-year lag. According to its Minnesota Report Card, such assaults decreased in grades K-5 during the first year of the suspensions ban — from 611 in 2022-23 to 349 in 2023-24.

Anoka-Hennepin Superintendent Cory McIntyre, making the case for the return of suspensions, told state senators that his district has seen 157 staff injuries this year, with 70% being in grades K-3, “due to challenging student behavior.”

In 2024-25, Anoka-Hennepin reported 101 staff injuries throughout the entire school year; 70 occurred in kindergarten through third grade.

Teachers are reluctant to speak publicly about disruptive students for fear of violating privacy laws prohibiting the release of identifying student data.

A veteran suburban teacher who asked that neither her name nor that of her school’s be used for that reason said she has seen notable changes in student behavior and parental attitudes over time. The increase in students punching and spitting, she said, have made grades K-3 feel “very, very different.”

In the past, the teacher said, if she were to tell a parent she had been struck by their child, she’d hear, “Oh my gosh. Thanks for letting me know.” But recently, when inviting a parent into her classroom, and then sharing a similar message, she heard no apology — almost as if the behavior was somehow acceptable.

“The lack of shock is shocking,” the teacher said.

She has saved the district’s “work injury hotline” number in her cellphone and said she’s called it several times this year.

Rather than turning again to suspensions, student advocates say schools should invest in ways to help young students better understand their emotions and learn coping strategies for when feeling overwhelmed.

Students can‘t afford to miss school, the advocates say.

Matt Shaver, senior policy director for the education advocacy group EdAllies, which works closely with underserved communities, said 88% of Anoka-Hennepin students consistently attended school before the pandemic. In 2023-24, the figure dropped to 77%.

Jessica Webster, a staff attorney at Mid-Minnesota Legal Aid, said she worked with Abeler on bill. She said she appreciates that the lawmaker agreed to spell out that students could not be suspended for conduct characterized as “disruptive or disorderly,” or for verbal exchanges not likely to lead to physical violence.

“We’re moving forward,” Webster said. “We’re trying to address the issues that schools are raising while still protecting the rights of children.”

But, she added, she remains on “high alert for racial disparities.”

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