School Law
Do you know your rights &
responsibilities as a teacher?
Teachers’ Rights & Responsibilities
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Employment
Academic Freedom
Copy Rights
Teacher Liability
Child Abuse
Teachers’ Private Lives
Teacher Rights & Responsibilities
• Employment
– Licensure
• State evaluates your credentials
– Bachelor’s degree – accredited college/university
• Screened for felony arrest, history of abusing/molesting children
• Competency Tests
– Controversial, but have held up in court
– Contracts
• Teaching contract – legal employment agreement between you
and a local school board
– Cannot discriminate
• School board can be sued if they break contract w/out due cause
• You can loose your certificate if you breach your contract
• READ IT CAREFULLY
EMPLOYMENT
• Organizations
– National Education Association (NEA) or American
Federation of Teachers (AFT)
• Collective Bargaining
– Occurs when a local chapter negotiates with a school
district over the rights & responsibilities
– Most states – law – largest organization – final
agreement – applies to all teachers
– Teachers may file a grievance – formal complaint
against an employer alleging unsatisfactory working
conditions
• Cannot be fired
• Professional organization – legal counsel
– Political
Employment
• Tenure
– Legal safeguard that provides job security by
preventing teacher dismissal without due cause
– Designed to protect teachers from political or
personal abuse
– Most districts require probationary period before
tenure is granted – 3 years
– Can be dismissed: incompetence, immoral behavior,
insubordination or unprofessional conduct
– Due process must be observed, when charges of filed
• A written description, access to evidence & names of
witnesses, right to representation, school board decision
based on finding of hearing, written record of hearing and
right to appeal
Employment
• Dismissal
– Yearly contract until you are tenured
– Reduction in force
• Budget cuts, declining student numbers, course/program
cancellations
• Typically dismissed teachers with least seniority
• Can involve tenure and nontenure teachers
– Dishonesty on job application
– Reduction in job force
• http://www.kentucky.com/2014/09/27/3450185/asfamilies-flee-coal-country.html
Academic Freedom
• Refers to your right to choose both content &
teaching methods based on your professional
judgment
• 1st Amendment – protects freedom of speech
– So when do you as a teacher go to far??
Academic Freedom
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State & District Curriculum frameworks – guides
Free to teach topics that you see fit within each
Discipline or even dismissed
Courts consider the following
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Goal in discussing the topic
Age of students involved
Relevance of materials
Quality of questioned material/method
Existence of policies related to issues
Academic Freedom
• Public Employee vs. Private Citizen
• Clear goals, justify them
• Unsure – check with principal or school
administrator
• Grading
– Consistent
– Evidence
Copyright Laws
• Copyright laws - Federal laws designed to protect
the intellectual property of authors
• Fair use guidelines – policies that specify
legitimate needs of teachers & learners
• Examples of what you can and cannot do
– Software – back one only 1
– Record something on television – show it within 10
days
– Cannot charge students more than what it is worth
– Government document – you can print as many as
you want
Teacher Liability
Teacher Liability
• Legally responsible for the safety of students
• In loco parentis – “in place of the parents”
• Negligence – a teacher’s or other school employee’s
failure to exercise sufficient care in protecting students
from injury
• Parent can and will sue
• Courts consider:
– Reasonable attempt to anticipate dangerous situations
– Proper precautions & establish rules & procedures to
prevent injuries
– Warn students of possible dangerous situations
– Provide proper supervision
Teacher Liability
• Field trips – parent consent form
• Consider – ages & developmental levels
• Some classes & ages & students = require
more supervision
• Accidents can and do happen – liability
insurance
Child Abuse
• What do you have to do when you suspect it?
Child Abuse
• All 50 states & DC have laws requiring
educators to report suspected child abuse
• Protected by legal action if you acted in “good
faith” & without “malice”
• Report it to administration/counselors
• All schools have procedures put in place
Teachers’ Private Life
• How private is your life outside of school?
Teachers’ Private Lives
• You do more than teach, you are a ROLE MODEL
– Scrutinized more
• Clear answers do not exist
– Consider the community in which you live and teach?
– Court cases
• Notoriety – the extent to which a teacher’s
behavior becomes known as controversial.
• Classroom – is not yours – it is public – therefore
no illegal activity
Religion In Schools
• Can there be prayer in schools?? Football
games?? Graduation??
Religion and the Law
• 1st Amendment
• Prayer in Schools
– Sanctioned prayer and religious symbols – violate
separation of church and state
– Student/parent led – not a violation, but still may be a
violation
• Religious Clubs/Organizations
– Schools must allow
• Religion in the Curriculum
– only When a clear purpose is presented
Students’ Rights & Responsibilities
• Do you know your rights and responsibilities
as a student??
• Is corporal punishment still legal??
• Can I give your grades out to anyone??
Students’ Rights & Responsibilities
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Freedom of speech
Freedom from sexual harassment
Permissible search & seizure
Records & privacy
Corporal Punishment
Rights in disciplinary actions
Students with AIDS
Freedom of Speech
• Students have the right to free speech in
schools – when it doesn’t interfere with
learning
• Examples from the book
Freedom of Speech
• What would happen if you created a mock
MySpace profile for your principal and posted
outrageous & unbelievable statements??
Freedom of Speech
• Cyberbullying
– What can schools do?? - not clear
– Teachers – take a stand in your class – that it is
unacceptable behavior
• Sexting
– Students send sexual photos, videos from one cell phone
to another.
– 5% - 20%
– Form of cyberbullying
– Schools – interested in keeping children from harm, but
hesitant to become involved in personal matters
– Pic of person under 18 – Child pornography
Freedom of Speech
• Dress codes
– Expression of who you are
– 1st Amendment protected?? - Complex answer
– Clothes – interfere with the learning?? Harmful to
other students??
• School Uniforms
– Courts – rule in favor of - Better student behavior
Sexual Harassment
• What is sexual harassment?
Sexual Harassment
• Common on many school campuses
• Parents – courts
• In GA, parents of 5th grader sue the school
district – they won
• Teachers – monitor student actions (classroom
& hallways)
• Clearly communicate that it will not be
tolerated
Can you identify……
• Teachers’ Rights & Responsibilities
• Students’ Rights & Responsibilities
Question:
• Can I legally search your property (purse, gym
bag)??? Locker?
Permissible Search & Seizure
• 4th Amendment – protects citizens from unlawful search &
seizure & warrants are required
• Educators – dilemmas
• Students – rights, however due to drug/alcohol use &
violence – administrators feel compelled to do something
– T.L.O. – denied smoking – teacher opened purse – found cigs,
then emptied purse
• Courts – legal – certain problem – schools – probable cause
– Metal detectors – nonintrusive
– Strip searches – illegal (generally)
• Example: girl – dog, students – money
– Lockers – school property – reasonable cause
• Texas – monitoring chips in name tags??
What is FERPA??
Student Records & Privacy
• Family Educational Rights & Privacy Act
(FERPA), Buckley Amendment – federal act
that makes school records accessible to
students & their parents
– Inform parents of their rights regarding their child
records
– Provide parents access to their child’s records
– Procedures that allow parent to challenge &
possibly amend information
– Protect parents for disclosure of information to
third parties
Corporal Punishment
• The use of physical, punitive disciplinary
actions to correct student misbehavior
• Highly controversial
• Prohibited in 30 states & DC
• Common in the South
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http://kyyouth.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Ending-Corporal-Punishment-in-KentuckyPublic-Schools.pdf
Corporal Punishment
• Legal guidelines suggest:
• Psychologists disapprove
– Negative side effects: model of aggression
– More effective alternatives
Disciplinary Actions
• 14th Amendment – no “state shall deprive any
person of life, liberty or property with out due
process of law”
• Due process – key element in disciplinary
matters
• Students – right to education – limiting that
right – due process must be followed
• No expulsion or suspended 10 or less, =
administration free to discipline as they see fit
– Longer – procedures are detailed & formal
Disciplinary Actions & Students with
Exceptionalities
• Provided with legal safeguards under IDEA
• If the student’s behavior was not a
manifestation of their disability – discipline
same as other students – however, school has
to provide educational services in an
alternative placement
• Special circumstances – student can be
removed up to 45 day – regardless if it was a
manifestation of disability
Students with AIDS
• School cannot discriminate against individuals
Questions