Overlawyered » schools

“Texas honor student jailed for missing too much school”

Walter Olson — Sun, 27 May 2012 04:03:54 +0000

“[Diane] Tran said she works both full-time and part-time jobs, in addition to taking advanced and college level courses,” and her parents have “split up and moved away” leaving her in charge of a younger sister, which make it hard to keep to the exact school day. Judge Lanny Moriarty did not seem sympathetic: “If you let one run loose, what are you gonna’ do with the rest of ‘em?” [CBS Atlanta]

Tags: schools, Texas

“Texas honor student jailed for missing too much school” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

“School Nurse Denies Inhaler, Watches Student Lose Consciousness”

Walter Olson — Sat, 26 May 2012 13:11:14 +0000

Following the rules in Florida: a 17-year-old high school student “very nearly died because the school nurse refused to let him use his inhaler because his mother didn’t sign a form.” [Isa-Lee Wolf, Yahoo via Free-Range Kids]

Tags: pharmaceuticals, schools

“School Nurse Denies Inhaler, Watches Student Lose Consciousness” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Reluctant to recant rape accusation

Walter Olson — Fri, 25 May 2012 12:23:46 +0000

Brian Banks served more than five years in prison after an old friend “falsely accused him of attacking her on their high school campus”:

In a strange turn of events, the woman, Wanetta Gibson, friended him on Facebook when he got out of prison.

In an initial meeting with him, she said she had lied; there had been no kidnap and no rape and she offered to help him clear his record, court records state.

But she refused to repeat the story to prosecutors because she feared she would have to return a $1.5 million payment from a civil suit brought by her mother against Long Beach schools….

It was uncertain Thursday whether Gibson will have to return the money.

[AP via Balko, Volokh; & welcome Reddit readers]

Meanwhile, on the opposite coast, high-profile Brooklyn sex crimes prosecutor Lauren Hersh has resigned following a furor over a sex trafficking case in which “prosecutors had held on to documents showing the victim recanted rape allegations one day after making them.” [NY Post, more] P.S. Daniel Fisher reminds us of Hersh’s “starring role in New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof’s expose of Backpage, the Village Voice’s online personals section.”

Tags: NYC, prosecutorial abuse, schools, third party liability for crime

Reluctant to recant rape accusation is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Education roundup

Walter Olson — Wed, 09 May 2012 04:06:33 +0000

Thomas Cooley Law School in Michigan, facing class-action suit, subpoenas Colorado lawprof Paul Campos, vocal critic of schools’ disclosure policies [Campos, Scott Greenfield]
“Maintenance of effort”: Yielding to special ed lobby, feds won’t let local school districts cut outlays [Nirvi Shah, Ed Week] “Havoc in classrooms” feared as NYC pushes least restrictive placement of disabled students [NY Post] Feds to universities: it’s an ADA violation to ask suicidal students to leave [WFAE, Popehat]
Arizona lawmaker proposes ban on political viewpoint discrimination in faculty hiring [Inside Higher Ed]
“University of Maryland Cuts Varsity Cheer Program” [Washington Post] Title IX competes with true gender equality
[Doug Robinson, Deseret News via Saving Sports]
Due-process revolution in school discipline hasn’t worked out as intended [Richard Arum, The Atlantic] Heavy police presence in schools is something new [J.D. Tuccille, Reason] “Education Department Pushes Racial Quotas in School Discipline” [Hans Bader, CEI]
“What Yale and the Times Did to Patrick Witt” [KC Johnson, Minding the Campus]

Tags: colleges and universities, disability & schools, law schools, New York Times, school discipline, schools, suici, Title IX, Yale

Education roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Lawyer-dad: so what if my son cheated?

Walter Olson — Sat, 28 Apr 2012 04:11:38 +0000

“The parents of a Peninsula high school sophomore are suing the school district for kicking the teenager out of an honors class because he cheated.” Jack Berghouse and his wife do not dispute that their son committed plagiarism, but their lawsuit claims “the school’s policies regarding punishment for cheating are vague and contradictory and shouldn’t be enforced.” [KCBS, KGO, San Jose Mercury News]

Tags: Bay Area, schools

Lawyer-dad: so what if my son cheated? is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Labor and employment roundup

Walter Olson — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 04:03:55 +0000

“Increasing Employment Discrimination Awards to Take Account of Adverse Tax Consequences” [TaxProf]
NRA’s wrong on this: “Bill to bar employer bias against gun owners gets OK from Missouri House” [St. Louis Post-Dispatch]
ALJ: “we are an at-will employer” handbook statement violates NLRA [Duane Morris Institute]
“What the EEOC’s Strategic Plan Means for Employers” [Laura Harshbarger, NYLELR]
Connecticut bill would require public schools to teach organized labor history [Raised S.B. No. 304; background from a supporter, PDF; h/t Fountain]
SEIU hand seen in “Occupy”-allied sit-ins targeting GOP politicians [Richard Pollack, Daily Caller]
Wage and Hour Litigation is Big—and Getting Bigger” [Shannon Green, Corporate Counsel]

Tags: Connecticut, EEOC, guns, labor unions, Missouri, schools, taxes, wage and hour suits, workplace

Labor and employment roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Penalty for webcam spying

Walter Olson — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 04:04:15 +0000

As Radley Balko notes, it seems to vary rather widely depending on whether the wrongdoer is a student or an educator.

Tags: Pennsylvania, privacy, schools

Penalty for webcam spying is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Sacramento’s Bad Humor Man

Walter Olson — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 14:46:41 +0000

Assemblyman William Monning (D-Carmel) wants to ban food trucks from parking anywhere near where schoolkids might be; under legislation he has proposed, they would need to keep even farther away from schools than medical marijuana dispensaries. Since schools dot the urban scene, a side effect would be to seriously curtail adult access to the trucks, which serve a large population of working adults and have lately found new popularity among foodies. [L.A. Times via Heather Mac Donald, Secular Right, earlier]

Tags: California, obesity, schools

Sacramento’s Bad Humor Man is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

The “right to receive free compulsory education”

Walter Olson — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 12:04:40 +0000

Mark Steyn on the paradoxes of our contemporary proliferation of rights-coinage, in which even being deprived of a choice can count as a right [NRO]

Tags: international human rights, schools

The “right to receive free compulsory education” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

C.S. Lewis and the food police

Walter Olson — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 13:30:38 +0000

“It may be better to live under robber barons,” wrote the British author, “than under omnipotent moral busybodies.” [Barton Hinkle, Richmond Times-Dispatch] The federal government is preparing new rules restricting snack foods available through local schools, “which could include banning the candy sold for school fund-raisers,” notwithstanding a recent study finding no link between vending machine availability and child obesity [New York Times] And a blog supporter of bans on birthday cupcakes and soda machines in schools responds to her critics [Bettina Elias Siegel, "The Lunch Tray" and more]

P.S. And thanks to Pete Warden in comments for the relevant George Orwell quote.

Tags: nanny state, obesity, schools

C.S. Lewis and the food police is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system