Discrimination is unfair treatment of one particular person or group of people. Learn how to file a discrimination complaint with the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights.A child can be discriminated against on multiple grounds. Discrimination is the unfair or prejudicial treatment of people and groups based on characteristics such as race, gender, age, or sexual orientation. Discrimination means, at a very basic level, the act of separating out singular things or groups of things. It can be both an adjective and a verb. When we teach kids early on that it's OK to talk about race, we help them to understand, respect, and appreciate the differences between people.