The Student Press Law Center reports that the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington has sent a letter to Everett School District’s superintendent, charging that Samantha Negrete, a student at North Middle School, was forced to log onto her Facebook account so Vice Principal Bryan Toutant could view it.
Continue reading...According to an Associated Press report in the Longview Daily News, the U.S. Department of Justice recently settled a suit with Lesley University in Washington over accommodating students with food allergies.
Continue reading...Finding that it will be of precedential value now, the State of Washington Court of Appeals has granted a school district’s motion to publish the appellate court’s July 2012 opinion, in which it upheld the trial court’s dismissal of a landlord’s claim that he, and his brother, was defamed by a statement in a story published by a school district’s student newspaper that said they had “been accused of racist renting policies.”
Continue reading...In a 7-2 split, the Supreme Court of the State of Washington has ruled that a school resource officer, who is a member of a local police department, violated a student’s right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure under the federal and state constitutions when he searched the student’s locked backpack after arresting the student and handcuffing him.
Continue reading...Mark Walsh reports in Education Week’s School Law Blog that the U.S. Supreme Court has denied review to a petition for certiorari in Payne v. Peninsula School District, Docket No. 11-539, a case implicating the exhaustion of administrative remedies requirement under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Peninsula School District (PSD) was seeking review of a federal appeals court decision ruling that because the mother’s suit raised constitutional claims in addition to claims under the federal special education law, the suit did not have to exhaust administrative remedies under the IDEA.
Continue reading...The Washington Supreme Court has ruled that the state has failed to meet its constitutional duty under article IX, section 1 of the state constitution to adequately fund the “education” of K-12 students. The court concluded that the state had “consistently failed to provide adequate funding for the program of basic education, including funding for essential operational costs such as utilities and transportation, which resulted in local school districts turning increasingly to excess levies to make up the shortfall.”
Continue reading...According to the Seattle Times, the Seattle School Board is considering loosening its ban on unhealthful food in high schools after complaints from student governments that the policy has cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars in vending-machine profits over the past seven years.
Continue reading...Washington Superior Court Judge Bryan Chushcoff has approved a temporary restraining order (TRO) requiring striking Tacoma teachers to return to work and both sides to resume negotiations, says the News Tribune. The TRO requires the teachers to return to work until a full hearing can be held on the legality of their walkout or until they reach a contract agreement with the school district, whichever comes first.
Continue reading...In a split decision, the majority of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (CA, OR, WA, AZ, MT, ID, NV, AK, HI, GU, MP), sitting en banc (all active judges participating in consideration and decision of the case), has ruled that the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act’s (IDEA) exhaustion of administrative remedies requirement is not jurisdictional and, instead, is an affirmative defense that must raised by a school district or is waived. The majority also ruled that IDEA’s exhaustion requirement only applies when the relief sought by a plaintiff is available under IDEA.
Continue reading...Courthouse News Service reports that King County Superior Court Judge Kimberly Prochnau has ruled that Seattle School District No. 1 is not “vicariously liable” for allegedly defamatory statements in an article published in the Roosevelt High School student newspaper asserting that brothers Hugh and Drake Sisley had been accused of “racist renting policies.”
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