Justia Education Law Opinion Summaries

After receiving a long suspension, Jacob Doe sued Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (“Virginia Tech”) and several university officials, alleging that Virginia Tech’s Title IX investigation, hearing, and appeal process denied him due process of law. The district court dismissed Doe’s complaint, holding that he hadn’t alleged a cognizable liberty or property interest in his continuing education.   The Fourth Circuit affirmed for a different reason. The court held that even assuming Doe has such an interest, he hasn’t alleged that he was deprived of it without sufficient process. The court wrote that Doe complains that his witnesses couldn’t appear in person at the hearing because it was held during the summer. But he doesn’t allege that the witnesses weren’t able to provide testimony by phone, video, or in writing. Nor does Doe claim he sought to continue the hearing until his witnesses were available. And Doe admits that the investigator interviewed his witnesses during her investigation into Roe, and the allegations against Roe were adjudicated at the same hearing. So these allegations too, don’t rise to the level of a due-process violation.   Moreover, the court explained that to find that Doe alleged a due-process violation on this sparse record, the court would have to hold that university students have a right—in effectively every disciplinary hearing—to advance notice of the evidence to be presented against them. The ask is even more striking here because Doe doesn’t allege that he sought a continuance or that Virginia Tech relied on the surprise testimony. Therefore, the court rejected Doe’s claim of error. View "Jacob Doe v. Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State Universit" on Justia Law

In 2016, San Francisco voters amended their city charter to authorize voting in local school board elections by noncitizen parents and guardians of school-age children. In 2018, the Board of Supervisors enacted an ordinance implementing Proposition N, including provisions requiring the City’s Department of Elections to develop a noncitizen voter registration form for school board elections. In 2022, after multiple school board elections in which noncitizens voted, this lawsuit was brought alleging the charter amendment violated the California Constitution. The trial court granted found the effective ordinance void and unenforceableThe court of appeal reversed and awarded the city costs. Neither the plain language of the Constitution nor its history prohibits legislation expanding the electorate to noncitizens. The relevant constitutional provisions authorizing home rule permit charter cities to implement such an expansion in local school board elections. This authority is consistent with the principles underlying home rule and permits the voters of each charter city to determine whether it is good policy for their city or not. View "Lacy v. City and County of San Francisco" on Justia Law

Porat, the Dean of the Fox School of Business at Temple University, was “almost obsessed with rankings.” To manipulate Fox’s U.S. New and World Report rankings, he submitted false information about students taking the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT), offers of admission, student debt, and average undergraduate GPA. Partly because of these deceptions, With Porat’s knowledge and involvement, Fox aggressively marketed its false high rankings. At trial, former students testified that they chose Fox because of its rankings or that they believed employers hire students from schools with the best “brand” and that Fox’s high rankings would help them “compete in the marketplace.” The government estimated that Fox gained nearly $40 million in tuition from the additional students who enrolled during 2014–2018. In 2018, Porat’s scheme was exposed. Fox administrators disclosed the false GMAT data to U.S. News, which announced Fox’s “misreported data.” As Fox’s rankings fell, its enrollment fell.The Third Circuit affirmed Porat’s convictions for conspiracy to commit wire fraud, 18 U.S.C. 371, and wire fraud, section 1343. The government proved by sufficient evidence that he sought to deprive his victims of money, that he sought to personally obtain money, or that the party he deceived was the same party he defrauded of money (“convergence” View "United States v. Porat" on Justia Law

School districts may levy “qualified special taxes,” Government Code section 50079, with the approval of two-thirds of district voters. A qualified special tax must “apply uniformly to all taxpayers or all real property within the school district” (with some statutory exemptions) and not be “imposed on a particular class of property or taxpayers.” Measure A, approved in 2020 by voters in the Alameda Unified School District, authorizes a tax on improved parcels at “the rate of $0.265 per building square foot not to exceed $7,999 per parcel.” In Traiman’s action challenging Measure A, the trial court ruled that the tax was not applied uniformly and invalidated the tax. The court awarded Traiman $374,960 in attorney fees (Code of Civil Procedure section 1021.5).The court of appeal reversed. Measure A tax applies uniformly within the meaning of section 50079 because every nonexempt taxpayer and every improved parcel in the District is taxed using the same formula. Neither the language of the statute, case law, legislative history, nor public policy indicates that a school district cannot base a qualified special tax on building square footage with a maximum tax per parcel. View "Traiman v. Alameda Unified School District" on Justia Law

The plaintiffs, three transgender boys, were denied access to the boys’ bathrooms at school. The boys sued the districts and the school principals, alleging sex discrimination under Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972 and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The boys requested preliminary injunctions that would order the schools to grant them access to the boys’ bathrooms and, in the case of two boys, access to the boys’ locker rooms when changing for gym class. The district courts granted the preliminary injunctions.The Seventh Circuit affirmed, noting that litigation over transgender rights is occurring all over the country and that at some point the Supreme Court will likely step in with more guidance than it has furnished so far. The district courts appropriately followed Circuit precedent in crafting narrowly tailored and fact-bound injunctions. There was no abuse of discretion in the balancing of the equities and the public interest. The records showed only speculative harms, which are not enough to tip the balance. View "A.C. v. Kutruff" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court held that, in disciplinary proceedings, private universities are not required to provide accused students the opportunity to directly or indirectly cross-examine the accuser and other witnesses at a live hearing with the accused student in attendance, either in person or virtually.The University of Southern California and its vice president of student affairs (collectively, USC) expelled Appellant after conducting an investigation and determining that Appellant violated USC's policy against engaging in intimate partner violence. Appellant filed a petition for a writ of administrative mandate, arguing that he was deprived of a fair trial under Cal. Code Civ. Proc. 1094.5. The court of appeals agreed, determining that USC's disciplinary procedures were unfair because they denied Appellant a meaningful opportunity to cross-examine critical witnesses at an in-person hearing. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that requiring private universities to conduct the hearing envisioned by the court of appeals was contrary to fair procedure caselaw. View "Boermeester v. Carry" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against The University of Miami (Miami), alleging the school should refund a portion of the payments that she made for the Spring 2020 semester since she did not receive the expected benefit of in-person learning. Plaintiff marshaled a number of claims, including breach of express contract, breach of implied contract, and unjust enrichment. Miami filed a motion for summary judgment on each of Plaintiff’s claims, which the district court granted in full.   The Eleventh Circuit affirmed. The court explained that it is entirely valid for Plaintiff to take the position that Miami should have based its prorated refunds on a different day than it did. The problem, however, is that Plaintiff fails to present “more than a scintilla” of evidence to support her contention that Miami should have refunded 48% of the fees for the Spring 2020 semester. The court reasoned that an announcement extending spring break by itself does not support the contention that all fee-based facilities and services were suddenly unavailable to students such that Miami’s refund was inadequate. And while Plaintiff offers a report from an unsworn economist’s input as evidence, Plaintiff cannot rely on that report to show there is a genuine issue of material fact about this point. Unsworn reports may not be taken into account by a district court when it rules on a motion for summary judgment. View "Adelaide Dixon v. University of Miami" on Justia Law

The Jefferson Parish School Board (JPSB) separately suspended two students for individually having a BB gun visible during virtual school. Each student’s family sued the school board, in part seeking a declaration that the school board’s virtual learning disciplinary policy is unconstitutional. Louisiana intervened, agreeing with the families on the constitutionality of JPSB’s policy and separately challenging JPSB’s disciplinary actions as ultra vires. JPSB settled with the families, ending the private suits. Louisiana wants to continue the case, citing its broad interest in compliance with its laws. The question before us is whether Louisiana has standing to do so.   The Fifth Circuit concluded that Louisiana does not have Article III standing and remanded the case to the district court to send back to the capable Louisiana state courts. The court explained that this case lies outside the limits of Article III standing. States undoubtedly have an interest in enforcing their laws. But when it comes to federal courts, Louisiana must claim an injury to a traditional, sovereign interest to invoke Article III jurisdiction. The two are distinctly dissimilar. Louisiana fails to point to “any precedent, history, or tradition,” establishing that its interest in compliance with its laws is the equivalent of an Article III sovereign interest in maintaining its right to govern in the face of competing authority. The state similarly fails to establish an injury to an established quasi-sovereign interest sufficient to show parens patriae standing. Louisiana’s claim of injury to a proprietary interest also falls short. View "LA State v. Jefferson Parish Sch" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, on behalf of a putative class of students, sued Southern Methodist University (“SMU”) for refusing to refund tuition and fees after the university switched to remote instruction during the COVID-19 pandemic. The district court dismissed Plaintiff’s complaint for failure to state a claim.   The Fifth Circuit reversed that decision in light of King v. Baylor University, 46 F.4th 344 (5th Cir. 2022), which was issued after the district court’s ruling and which teaches that Hogan adequately pled a breach-of-contract claim. Alternatively, the district court held that Texas’s Pandemic Liability Protection Act (“PLPA”) retroactively bars Plaintiff’s claim for monetary relief and is not unconstitutionally retroactive under the Texas Constitution. That latter ruling raises a determinative-but-unsettled question of state constitutional law, which the court certified to the Texas Supreme Court: Does the application of the Pandemic Liability Protection Act to Plaintiff’s breach-of-contract claim violate the retroactivity clause in article I, section 16 of the Texas Constitution? View "Hogan v. Southern Methodist Univ" on Justia Law

C.S. has developmental and cognitive disabilities, including autism spectrum disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. C.S., then in sixth grade attempted to use the hallway elevator. A teacher told C.S. to stop. C.S. did not comply. Ultimately, three staff members forced C.S. onto the floor and pinned her face down while handcuffing her hands behind her back, and later bound her legs before returning her to her wheelchair. C.S. was handcuffed and bound for 34 minutes until her mother, Thomas, took her home. Thomas also alleged that days later, C.S. may have scratched or grabbed another student and was required to eat her lunch in the school office. While there, C.S. became dysregulated, prompting staff to respond “with similar aggressive force,” including calling the police. The District sought a juvenile delinquency prosecution of C.S. Charges were dropped when C.S. was found not competent to stand trial. A.S. (C.S.’s brother) had previously attended the same school and, after an incident, the school’s then-principal requested charges against A.S. His prosecution was also dropped after a finding that he was incompetent to stand trial.Thomas alleged (42 U.S.C. 1983) that the District had a “practice or protocol of utilizing excessive punitive and retaliatory force or threats of force to punish students with behavioral disabilities.” The Seventh Circuit affirmed the dismissal of Thomas’s suit. Thomas failed to plausibly allege a widespread custom or practice of violating disabled students’ Fourth Amendment rights. View "Thomas v. Neenah Joint School District" on Justia Law