African American middle school students are more likely to find themselves in trouble in school and to end up being disciplined and suspended opposed to white students. Gauger-Cobbs Middle School is one of four public comprehensive middle schools in the Christina School District. African American students receive out-of-school suspension three times more than their White counterpart at Gauger-Cobbs. During the 2018-2019 academic school year, African American students at Gauger-Cobbs Middle school were suspended more than any other ethnic demographic. The aim of this study is to measure the effectiveness of the implementation of a District Wide Social Emotional Learning Curriculum and how it impacts the suspensions of African American students in middle school. As a classroom educator at both the middle and high school levels for over twenty-five years, the exorbitant number of witnessed suspensions of African American students lead me to conduct this study. Since implementing the Social and Emotional Learning Curriculum at Gauger-Cobbs Middle School, suspension rates for African American 7th grade students decreased. The results indicate that 7th grade African American students show a decrease in their suspensions when they actively participate in a Social Emotional Learning curriculum that is supported by a Positive Behavior Support Rewards system and adult monitoring. The SEL intervention curriculum in this study, as compared to the previous school year for the same students, show a 61% decrease in out-of-school suspensions and a 43% decrease for in-school suspensions. On this basis, it is recommended that 7th grade African American students who face behavior challenges in school, participate in a SEL tiered intervention program. Those in middle schools that have a high suspension rate of African American students will benefit from reading this work. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com.bibliotheek.ehb.be/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]