Editor’s note: This story was originally published at 4:46 p.m. on June 10, 2025. It was updated at 10:23 a.m. on June 11, 2025, to include a response from Superintendent Thomas Taylor.
Some students and several local community organizations are concerned that upcoming changes to the Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) student code of conduct will lead to increased suspensions and learning loss and will negatively impact Black, Latine and disabled students, according to a letter sent last week to MCPS leadership and the county school board.
The new code of conduct “claims to center restorative approaches, but it actually puts punitive measures before restorative justice,” said Wednesday’s letter, which was signed by 12 community organizations, including Young People for Progress, a Montgomery County-based social justice organization for youth, and the ACLU of Maryland. Other signers include CASA, a Maryland-based immigrants’ rights organization, and the Silver Spring Justice Coalition, a nonprofit social justice advocacy group.
The letter was also signed by more than 100 students, parents and community members.
MCPS staff first introduced the potential changes to the 2025-2026 student code of conduct at the May 8 school board meeting. The shifts presented at the meeting included more severe punishments for some offenses, including attacks against other students, and more incorporation of restorative justice approaches, according to the staff presentation.
Mars Davis-Ford, a rising sophomore at Rockville High School and Young People for Progress member, said the group wants restorative justice to be “the standard” for school discipline. Data shows restorative justice has prevented recidivism of behavioral infractions in students, Davis-Ford said.
According to data MCPS presented to the County Council’s Education and Culture Committee in January, 79% of students who participated in restorative justice during the 2023-2024 school year didn’t reoffend that year, and using the practices reduced the number of Black students who were suspended by 20%.
“We just want MCPS to not put restorative justice in as a brownie point into the code of conduct … we want it to be the driving force of change for this county,” Davis-Ford said.
According to MCPS spokesperson Chris Cram, changes to the code of conduct are ongoing. MCPS didn’t respond to emailed requests for comment on the letter in time for publication.
In an email to Young People for Progress on Sunday provided to Bethesda Today, Superintendent Thomas Taylor said he was “certain” the groups would be “pleasantly surprised with the final product” because the recommendations were incorporated into the code of conduct.
“We wholeheartedly support and endorse expansion of our restorative justice work. It is important to note that restorative justice is not mutually exclusive to response consequences but rather they are more effective when they work in conjunction,” Taylor said in the email. “Our goal is to have a change in behavior and reduction in recidivism.”
Changes to the code of conduct
Peter Moran, MCPS chief school leadership officer, said during the May 8 school board meeting that the code updates will focus on school safety, communicating expectations for students, ensuring restorative approaches are used after infractions and improving partnerships with parents so consequences are communicated.
The code of conduct is based on “levels” of consequence. For example, the code of conduct currently says that a student who threatens an adult or another student could face one of five levels of escalating consequences.
Level one consequences are “teacher-led” and could include detention, restorative practices and/or guardian outreach. Level five consequences are “long-term administrative supported, out-of-school exclusionary and referral responses,” and include out-of-school suspension, expulsion and/or restorative practices.
According to the May 8 presentation, some expected revisions include increasing the severity of possible punishments for infractions such as drug possession and distribution, theft, bomb threats and attacks on students and staff. For example, students accused of making a bomb threat now face consequences ranging from five levels. Under the revision, students would face consequences at levels four and five.
Under the current code, students who attack a teacher or support staffer would face consequences ranging from level one to five, “meaning that you’re communicating to a teacher or supporting service member … that if they were to be attacked by a student, it would be appropriate for them to respond themselves,” Moran said. “That’s not the way that our system should run and demonstrates extremely low expectations for the character that we want to see out of our students.”
Moran said infractions subjected to level four consequences will be expanded to include recording and posting school fights on social media – an issue MCPS has had to navigate in recent years – among others.
Consequences at every level in the updated code of conduct will include a requirement for both a traditional punishment such as an in-school suspension and restorative practices.
Restorative approaches are a “mindset and philosophy toward school climate” focused on developing relationships and building community and healing the school community when harm has occurred, according to the MCPS website.
MCPS Superintendent Thomas Taylor noted MCPS says it often employs restorative justice as a part of discipline, but the district hasn’t “institutionalized restorative approaches to the level” that’s needed in order to be effective.
Moran said the new code of conduct updates emphasize restorative approaches as a “central component” of discipline in MCPS.
However, the local organizations and some student leaders don’t think it’s enough, according to Wednesday’s letter.
Student, organization concerns
The letter urges MCPS to prioritize restorative justice practices over punitive and exclusionary measures, and argues the introduced changes lower the threshold for in-school and out-of-school suspensions.
“We know this will increase student suspensions, learning loss, and push more students — especially Black students and students with disabilities — into the school-to-prison pipeline,” the letter said. “These changes feel performative — more focused on appearances than real commitment.”
Rebecca Mekonnen, a rising senior at Albert Einstein High School in Kensington and a member of Young People for Progress, told Bethesda Today that current overly punitive measures have created a divide between the administration and students, resulting in a tense school environment at Albert Einstein. Mekonnen said Einstein administrators have often closed several bathrooms due to students skipping class or smoking in the bathrooms.
“It was frustrating. As a human being, you need to use the bathroom. It’s a part of your personhood,” Mekonnen said. “It felt like the admin, they kind of just ignored the issue that students were actually facing … like if it was a tree, [they decided to] just cut off the branches, instead of the root.”
While the new code of conduct incorporates restorative practices, the letter argues the changes leave the responsibility of when and how to implement those practices to individual schools and don’t fully integrate them into the code.
Young People for Progress member Vivian Urbina, a rising senior at Watkins Mill High School in Gaithersburg, told Bethesda Today she believed the changes were a step in the right direction, but weren’t enough.
The organizations and students aren’t alone in their concerns about the impact changes could have. At the May 8 meeting, school board member Brenda Wolff (Dist. 5) expressed worries about the subjectivity of the code, noting that Black boys are often disproportionately disciplined for behaviors other students also exhibit.
“Any training is going to have to require a lot of discussion around these categories. And I have to say I’m going to be looking at variance between schools and within schools,” Wolff said. “I remain very concerned about impact here.”
The letter urges MCPS to fully integrate restorative approaches and create specific guidelines for required restorative practices at each consequence level, and for a full draft of the revised code to be shared with students, families and the community before it’s finalized.
“We need MCPS to make restorative justice the standard for every school — not just an option, not something left up to individual schools, but a consistent, countywide priority that truly puts students first,” the letter said.
