Education Rights
Basic Education Rights
The 3 Most Important Things to Remember about
Schools are required by state and federal law to take steps to help enroll “out-of-home” students, including students in foster care. These steps may include:
Waiving the requirement for parental signatures
Arranging for vaccinations at community clinics instead of requiring a written record of immunization
What are students’ basic rights and responsibilities?
1. Student rights A student has a basic right to an equal educational opportunity, which cannot be taken away
(i) on the basis of unlawful discrimination or
(ii) without due process of law. In this case, “due process of law” means that when a student faces losing the opportunity to go to school, he or she must be given notice and a chance to dispute the loss of that right.
Students also have rights of free speech, assembly (gathering with others), and free exercise of religion. All of these rights are subject to reasonable limits on the time, place, and manner of the activity.
Students also have the right not to have themselves or their possessions unreasonably searched or taken. But this does not mean that students can never be searched. Nor does it mean their possessions can’t be taken.
In order for the school staff to conduct a search of students or their belongings, the staff must have a “reasonable suspicion” that a violation of law or policy is taking place. This legal standard is less strict than what a police officer needs to know before searching someone.
School lockers can be searched at any time, without any particular suspicion that something illegal is happening.
See RCW 28A.600.220, 28A.600.240 and WAC 392-400-215 in Appendix D. Strip or body cavity searches of students by school staff are never allowed. See RCW 28A.600.230(3).Enrolling a homeless student or a student without any legal residence
Allowing a homeless youth to stay in his or her prior school or move to a new school and provide transportation even if it is not usually made available by the school. If you would like to read the law on this topic, you can find it in a public library.
See RCW 28A.225.215 and the McKinney Homeless Act at 42 U.S.C. § 11431. Children have the right to attend public school in the district where they live, even if they are homeless, have just moved to the area, or will live in the area for only a short time.
Schools must make prompt decisions regarding enrollment.
Schools may make exceptions to their usual rules or take other special steps needed to provide equal educational opportunities to out-of-home students.
Right to education in Washington State
There is a right to basic education in this state. Education is a right in Washington State. The Washington Constitution states that an ample education is the state’s paramount duty. It is the state’s highest, most important duty to provide a system of public education for students of school age.
See WA. CONST. Art.9, § 1 & 2.What does this right mean for students?
Students cannot be denied an education without due process of law. Washington courts have required that the legislature define what level of “basic education” will be provided to all students and to fund schools to provide this basic level of education. A school district cannot take away a student’s right to education without providing him or her with an opportunity to dispute the removal from school. School districts must have a very good reason to justify a permanent or indefinite removal of a student from school.
Students who are pregnant
Under state and federal law, pregnancy is generally considered to be a disability requiring accommodations.
Pregnant students cannot be denied access to education on the basis of their pregnancy.
See the text of WAC 392-400-215 cited below in Subsection 4. 3.Programs for homeless, migrant, bilingual, and Native American students
In addition to the federally funded, free or reduced-cost school lunch and breakfast programs, schools receive federal money to provide special programs and services to children who are homeless, migrant, needing bilingual instruction, or Native American.
OSPI offers a separate citizen’s complaint procedure for such federally funded programs.
See WAC 392-168.Students involved in the juvenile justice system
Some school districts are reluctant to enroll immediately or place in regular classrooms a student who is facing juvenile offender charges or who is on probation or parole from such charges. The general rule is that: No student may be denied an equal educational opportunity…because of national origin, race, religion, economic status, sex, pregnancy, marital status, previous arrest, previous incarceration, or a physical, mental, or sensory handicap.
See WAC 392-400-215.The only exceptions to this rule authorized by the Legislature are that a student convicted of a violent offense against a teacher or another student may not be placed in the same class as his/her victim, and that a student convicted of a sex offense against another student may not attend the same school as his/her victim or the victim’s siblings (who are also notified of the offender’s release from detention).
See RCW 28A.600.460 and RCW 13.40.215.Schools and juvenile authorities are generally authorized to share and exchange their records about a student who is a juvenile offender, but they are generally not authorized to disclose these shared records to others.
See RCW 28A.600.475 and RCW 13.50.050.If a school tells you that all youth released from juvenile detention must be enrolled in a special program, ask for information about the program’s curriculum and compare it with the basic education offered in the district’s regular schools. If there is a meaningful difference in the programs that matters to the student, consider filing a grievance with the school district or a discrimination complaint, and contact an advocacy organization.