Education Law

Edjurist NetVibes Aggregator

Posted on March 08, 2008
Ever wonder how I do it? How do I have time to read blogs and newspapers across the country everyday? Well, I have help. There are a lot of cool tools on the web that make the process of finding educational law news easier. Today, I will share one of my secrets so that you can use it too...

Friday Snippets: 03/07/08 - Douche Bag Soldiers & Jury Duty

Posted on March 07, 2008
Well, we are going to try a new feature here at The Edjurist Accord. I am beginning to get more than my standard 5-6 stories a week that I want to post to the blog with commentary, so I have decided to put links to all the additional stories I find in one post on Fridays (something to help you and me pass the time until the weekend)...

School Shooting ... Drills?

Posted on March 06, 2008
Police in Chicago are recommending that schools start putting their students through school shooting drills. Just as they hold fire drills to help prepare students on how to survive a blaze, schools should schedule regular training exercises on what to do when a gunman walks into a classroom, one law enforcement official said Monday...

Classrooms, Cel Phones and YouTube

Posted on March 06, 2008
All you teachers and administrators out there, you must check out a compilation of cel phone videos of classroom disputes between teachers and students that Scott McLeod at Iowa State put together at Dangerously Irrelevant . I would say it is shocking ...

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Loving Students' Creativity

Posted on March 05, 2008
Sometimes, you just got to hand it to the kids. This is one of those times. A group of 29 students in New Jersey, upset over shortened lunch periods, decided to pay for the their lunch in pennies ... 200 of them ... for a total of 5800 pennies for the 29 lunches...

A Student Bill of Rights?

Posted on March 04, 2008
Pete Reilly at Ed. Tech. Journeys has an interesting post on a students bill of rights he ran across in the UK (also check out today's post on the budget and deficit). The UK bill of rights flier contained the basics and was predicated on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child...

NY School Attorney Investigation Continues to Expand

Posted on March 03, 2008
The investigation of school attorneys in New York continues to expand. The list of districts required to submit information on how their school attorneys were compensated has now expanded to Westchester County as well, brining the total number of districts required to report information on school attorneys to 172, reports Newsday (via the ABA Journal's Martha Neil)...

More on Going Online with Law Journals.

Posted on March 02, 2008
A week or so ago I wrote a post about Publishing 2.0 and about how the faculty of the Harvard University Faculty of Arts and Sciences voted to retain the copyright of their work so that it could be posted freely online.  At the time I advocated for electronic, peer reviewed journals as a possible way to meet both needs...

See, Ed. Law Blogs Have a Purpose

Posted on March 01, 2008
Here is a testimonial from Lon in Oregon on using special education law blogs in his practice as an educator. Although it refers to a different educational law blog, the idea behind it (especially the 3rd paragraph below) is exactly why I publish here...

Drew Carey, Watts, Charters, Unions and School Boards - Yikes

Posted on March 01, 2008
Yeah - not kidding. But, not that bad either. Worth a watch, especially if you are a future administrator or anyone affiliated with a charter school.

Individualized Suspicion - Where art thou?

Posted on February 28, 2008
Well, our little hot streak of educational law news continues today. A whole class of students in Kentucky was patted down and asked to remove their shoes and socks after an envelop containing five dollars went missing from a teacher's desk. Okay .....

Democratic Debate sans Education

Posted on February 27, 2008
I watched the last (perhaps) Democratic primary debate last night. I am interested in the election generally, but over the past few weeks I have been noticing that education seems to be taking a back seat. Education was not a huge topic in the first democratic debates of the season (there have been 20!), but it usually made it into a question or two...

It Comes in Waves Sometimes

Posted on February 27, 2008
Well, just a day or two ago I was thinking to myself how quiet it has been on the educational law news front. I should have known better. I have been blogging for a couple years now and one thing I have learned is that educational law news comes in waves sometimes...

Kindergartener Suspended for Mohawk

Posted on February 27, 2008
A kindergartener in Parma, Oh outside Cleveland has been suspended for his Mohawk. The Cleveland Plain Dealer has the story and a picture. The school said the boy's haircut caused a disruption. Andrew Paulson at BoardBuzz, um, sort of defends the school and attacks the parent...

Interesting Bill on Teacher Decertification in Washington State

Posted on February 26, 2008
There is a bill in the Washington State Legislature that would make it easier for schools to decertify teachers for various crimes, mostly related to child abuse. I read the bill and it is pretty standard stuff. So standard, in fact, that the Washington NEA associate is backing the bill...

NY Investigation of School Lawyers Expands Across Long Island

Posted on February 26, 2008
Oh boy. The New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has caught wind of the school attorney scandal in a few districts on Long Island (see my earlier post) and is now requesting records on payments to school attorneys from all school districts across Long Island, reports Newsday and the ABA Journal...

Puerto Rican Teachers on Strike - Yeah, the Whole Island

Posted on February 24, 2008
Teachers across Puerto Rico are on strike. Because of their centralized education system (in which strikes are illegal) collective bargaining decisions are made at the state level; so, the strike is an Island-wide, illegal strike by the FMPR, a 42,000 teacher strong association...

The Restrictiveness of Student Speech Codes

Posted on February 24, 2008
There was an interesting back and forth between Thomas Sowell ( RealClearPolitics - their daily summary is one stop shopping for political articles) and Eugene Volokh (the Volokh Conspiracy - my favorite legal blog). The debate is over the relative restrictiveness of campus speech codes in schools, universities in particular...

English Language Learners & Litigation

Posted on February 22, 2008
One of the biggest challenges facing schools today are English Language Learners and the increased attention this group has received under NCLB. Next to special education, the English Language Learner population is the AYP subgroup most frequently responsible for schools being classified as in need of improvement...

Two Million Minutes: A Global Comparison

Posted on February 20, 2008
A new documentary, Two Million Minutes, is starting to get a lot of play. It follows the high schools years of students in India, China, and Carmel, Indiana (a rich Indianapolis Suburb). The movie has been released and I ordered a copy today and will report back when I watch it, but here is the trailer for the movie:Also here is an ABC News Interview with the Authors (Sorry about the Advertisement) and below is a local news story on the documentary:Also, for those of you that have not seen it yet, here is a link to Did You Know (I) and Did You Know 2...

And This is Why We Get a Bad Name ...

Posted on February 20, 2008
So, this is why we lawyers get a bad name. A school district lawyer in New York has been suspended from his law firm and is under investigation for being employed by multiple school districts as well as law firms as outside counsel. Apparently, he was hired as a full-time employee in five separate school districts at the same time and the ABA Journal reports he was credited with working 1,286 days in one year...

Paying for Term Papers

Posted on February 19, 2008
Well, my infatuation with AfterEd continues. In a new video, they look into the term paper industry. (Here is the transcript of the chat). Couple thoughts. First, I am highly, highly concerned about this type of activity in educational leadership programs...

Publishing 2.0

Posted on February 15, 2008
Check out this interesting vote by the Harvard University Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Basically, the move is designed to subvert the copyright power that scholarly journals have to limit access to scholarly research only to paying customers. This move allows professors and researchers on the faculty to post much of their research online, freely available to worldwide audiences...

One more push for NCLB Reauthorization before the Election

Posted on February 14, 2008
The rumors are starting to swirl again on NCLB Reauthorization. It seems Sen. Ted Kennedy and House Education Committee leaders are interested in giving NCLB Reauthorization one more push in the coming months before the election. While many still feel it is unlikely, including myself, Sen...

The Other Side in Educational Law: College President Removed in Religious Dispute

Posted on February 13, 2008
Perhaps a question I get asked more than any other by educational leadership practitioners is where to draw the line between following the black letter of the law and following the wishes of the community when they don't conform with the law. Of course, as a lawyer, I would never (or at least close to never) advocate a school leader disregard the law...

A Little on Leadership Preparation and Employment (While it Lasts)

Posted on February 12, 2008
It's not very often that my little group of researchers on educational leadership preparation makes the news, so when they do, I want to point it out. Ed Fuller, who works for UCEA at the University of Texas, is quoted in an article in the Austin-American Statesman, and his research on principal movement out of the profession is presented in the article...

New Award for Students Writing in Educational Law

Posted on February 11, 2008
Just wanted to pass along word that the Education Law Association has announced a new award for students writing in educational law: The George Jay Joseph Education Law Writing Award. The award is in conjunction with the Journal of Law and Education and the winning entry will be published in that legal journal...

Blogs on the Rise

Posted on February 10, 2008
As I mature in my blog use, I try to keep up with research on the increase of the use of blogs in the law. Well, the Law Librarian Blog has posted some statistics on the increase in the citations to blogs in Law Reviews. I know some of my readers are legal bloggers themselves, so keep up the good work...

Thoughts on Misconduct and Police in Schools

Posted on February 09, 2008
I just wanted to point you all to a thoughtful post at Teaching in the 408 on police patrolling in schools. TMAO reflects on the first year of the police presence in his school. I am going to post a lot of it here (with my thoughts after) because I want you to read it, but do me a favor and click over into his blog and finish it...

False Imprisonment: Teacher tapes student to chair in Chicago

Posted on February 09, 2008
Well, it continues to happen. When I teach intentional torts and false imprisonment to my students I can see them sitting there thinking ... who would ever do anything like that to a kid? And I tell them, you know, it happens all the time (unfortunately)...

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