Pupil discipline: suspensions and expulsions.

Existing law requires the principal or superintendent of schools to immediately suspend, and to recommend expulsion of, a pupil for certain acts committed at school or at a school activity off school grounds, including, among others, the unlawful selling of certain controlled substances, and the governing board of the school district is required to order a pupil expelled upon a finding that the pupil did commit one of these acts. This bill would specify that a pupil's first offense for the unlawful selling of not more than one avoirdupois ounce of marijuana, other than concentrated cannabis, is not an offense for which suspension or recommendation of expulsion by the principal or superintendent is mandatory, or for which expulsion by the governing board is mandatory, but is an offense for which suspension or expulsion may be imposed. The bill would require the governing board of the school district to base a decision to expel a pupil for that first offense on a finding that other means of correction are not feasible or have repeatedly failed to bring about proper conduct, or that due to the nature of the act, the presence of the pupil will cause a continuing danger to the physical safety of the pupil or others, or both.