In an opinion by the Honorable Superior Court Judge Henry S. Cohn, the Connecticut Superior Court dismissed the appeal of a teacher whose name was placed on the child abuse and neglect registry after a Department of Children and Families (“DCF”) hearing officer determined, pursuant to Conn. Gen. Stat. § 17a-101g (b), that the teacher […]
In the most recent of legal challenges to the recitation of our country’s Pledge of Allegiance by public school students, the U. S. Federal Court of Appeals for the First Circuit rendered a decision last month in the case of Freedom From Religion Foundation v. Hanover School District, 09-2473. In this case, the Court upheld as constitutional […]
In a decision issued in September 2008, a Connecticut Superior Court judge ruled in the case of Dornfried v. Berlin Board of Education, that there is no private right of action under Connecticut’s anti-bullying statute. In Dornfried, a high school student and his parents sued the principal, athletic director, and head football coach, claiming that the […]
In a decision released by the Connecticut Supreme Court on November 16, 2010, Board of Education of Region 16 v. State Board of Labor Relations et al., Region 16 appealed to the Superior Court challenging a decision by the state board of labor relations (“SBLR”) which concluded that the school district had unilaterally changed a condition […]
In a decision released Monday by the State of Connecticut Department of Education, Case No. 09-552, a hearing officer found a student with asthma and allergies triggered by various environmental allergens, including mold and pollen, was not eligible for special education services under the category of Other Health Impaired (OHI). The student, a senior in high school […]
The New Jersey Division of Civil Rights (NJDCR) recently announced a finding of probable cause in the discrimination complaint filed by the parent of a middle school student claiming that her son was subjected to a hostile school environment based upon harassment by his peers for his perceived sexual orientation and religion. What makes this […]
In Equal Employment Opportunity Commission v. Simply Storage Management, L.L.C. and O.B. Management Services, 2010 U.S. Dist., LEXIS 527661, (“E.E.O.C. v. Simply Storage”) the United States District Court, Southern District of Indiana, was asked to decide a basic discovery issue in a novel context when the parties to this sexual harassment suit failed to agree on whether […]
Beginning on July 1, 2010, schools will be required by law to implement the school suspension law first passed in 2007 creating a presumption for in-school suspension and whose implementation date was twice extended by the Connecticut legislature as recently as October 2009. With the close of the May 2010 legislative session, the Connecticut legislature […]
The Connecticut Superior Court in Burbank v. Canton Bd. Of Education, 2009 WL 3366272 (Conn. Super. 9/14/09) ruled against parents and students who sought to prohibit the Canton Public School District from continuing its practice of using local police to conduct suspicionless sweeps of parking lots and unattended lockers at its middle and high schools using dogs […]
In June 2007, the CT DOE started the process of revising the state special education regulations, and circulated its proposals for public comment. Based on the responses, the Department decided to revise its proposal and restart the review process. A new draft has emerged, dated February 3, 2010. According to the accompanying memorandum from Commissioner […]
