As the New York City Department of Education’s school discipline code is about to undergo its annual review, a think tank is calling for a complete overhaul that would borrow from private school models.

The group, Common Good, which advocates more common sense in applying the law, is pushing for the elimination of legal processes now specified by the code that it says get in the way of effective discipline. The changes the group supports would give teachers and principals more freedom to eject and suspend unruly students from classrooms.

“Over the past few decades, educators have lost the freedom to deal with the misbehaving students. It’s become a bureaucratic morass,” the founder of Common Good, Philip Howard, said.

During the tenure of the current schools chancellor, Joel Klein, the “Citywide Standards of Discipline and Intervention Measures,” as the code is known, has seen many additions, including new anti-bullying measures and restrictions on student Internet access. During the past several years, Mr. Klein and Mayor Bloomberg have also called for stricter enforcement of the rules.

But Common Good believes sweeping changes are required. “We think there needs to be a fundamental rethinking of the conditions for order and respect in the New York City schools,” Mr. Howard, who has written a book, “The Death of Common Sense” (Warner Books), said.

In place of the current oversight procedures, Common Good proposes creating parent panels to mediate complaints from students or parents who think a punishment is unfair, a concept borrowed from the “fairness committees” common in private schools.

The group and other educators began their calls for change three years ago, when Common Good published a report detailing what they characterized as a frustrating maze of procedures necessary to suspend a student for committing a serious offense. Its findings showed that, in some schools, it took as many as 70 school days to follow the series of steps — including scheduling hearings, mailing letters, and responding to appeals — required to suspend a student for behavior ranging from getting into a fight to selling drugs in school. Mr. Klein was reported to have reacted favorably to the study.

Currently, Common Good is discussing the feasibility of its proposals with officials from both the United Federation of Teachers and Mr. Klein’s office, as well as the possibility of starting up a pilot project to experiment with new models.

“I think there’s interest by both the teachers union and the Department of Education in discussing possible ways to improve the discipline code,” Mr. Howard said.

The group’s call for reform could be aided by recently published studies that have spotlighted failings in the discipline code, including a report by the city’s public advocate, Betsy Gotbaum, in which she says the suspension system is “dysfunctional” and argues for a broad overhaul of school safety measures. Other reports released this year, including one by the New York Civil Liberties Union, have also called for major changes in school safety policies.

This year’s annual revision has already begun internally in preparation for a public comment period this summer, a Department of Education spokeswoman, Dina Paul Parks, said. The final proposal for the new code is usually presented by August to be implemented when school starts in September.

“The reason we have the revision every year is to make sure we’re responsive to reality on the ground,” she said. “We have a very holistic approach to safety and ensuring order in a school.”

Despite the clamor, the maze of disciplinary procedures will probably stay largely intact, at least this year. The annual review usually only results in minor adjustments and amendments — rarely a dramatic change like the one Common Good advocates, Ms. Parks said.

“We’re in dialogue with Common Good along with a lot of other people and constituencies,” she said, but added: “This year, it seems that’s not in the cards; there will be much more tweaking and clarifying than whole-scale change.”