Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 5 of 5
Full-Text Articles in Law
A First Amendment Deference Approach For Reforming Anti-Bullying Laws, Emily Suski
A First Amendment Deference Approach For Reforming Anti-Bullying Laws, Emily Suski
Faculty Publications
This Article examines the anti-bullying laws and their response to the problem of bullying in light of both the nature of the problem itself, the interventions the laws call for, and the laws’ First Amendment implications. Bullying has many varied, negative consequences, some tragic, and is widespread. Yet, the anti-bullying laws disproportionately focus schools’ responses to bullying on school exclusion, meaning suspending, expelling or otherwise excluding students who bully from school. This is so even though social science literature has found school exclusion ineffective and sometimes counterproductive as a method for addressing bullying. What is more, because much of bullying …
Beyond The Schoolhouse Gates: The Unprecedented Expansion Of School Surveillance Authority Under Cyberbulling Laws, Emily Suski
Beyond The Schoolhouse Gates: The Unprecedented Expansion Of School Surveillance Authority Under Cyberbulling Laws, Emily Suski
Faculty Publications
For several years, states have grappled with the problem of cyberbullying and its sometimes devastating effects. Because cyberbullying often occurs between students, most states have understandably looked to schools to help address the problem. To that end, schools in forty-six states have the authority to intervene when students engage in cyberbullying. This solution seems all to the good unless a close examination of the cyberbullying laws and their implications is made. This Article explores some of the problematic implications of the cyberbullying laws. More specifically, it focuses on how the cyberbullying laws allow schools unprecedented surveillance authority over students. This …
School Bullying Victimization As An Educational Disability, Douglas E. Abrams
School Bullying Victimization As An Educational Disability, Douglas E. Abrams
Faculty Publications
Parts I and II of this essay urge school authorities, parents, and other concerned citizens to perceive bullying victimization as a disability that burdens targeted students. Since 1975, the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) has guaranteed “full educational opportunity to all children with disabilities” in every state. The IDEA reaches both congenital disabilities and disabilities that, like bullying victimization, stem from events or circumstances unrelated to biology or birth. To set the context for perceiving bullying victimization as an educational disability, Part I describes the public schools' central role in protecting bullied students, and then briefly discusses the …
Bullying Victimization As A Disability In Public Elementary And Secondary Education, Douglas E. Abrams
Bullying Victimization As A Disability In Public Elementary And Secondary Education, Douglas E. Abrams
Faculty Publications
This article discusses two reasons why likening bullying victimization to an educational disability makes sense. First, face-to-face bullying and cyberbullying impose on student victims the sort of educational deprivation that the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) addresses in the disabilities arena. Second, today’s belated public sensitivity to school bullying victims resembles the belated public sensitivity to students with disabilities that led to passage of the IDEA in 1975.
Recognizing The Public Schools' Authority To Discipline Students' Off-Campus Cyberbullying Of Classmates, Douglas E. Abrams
Recognizing The Public Schools' Authority To Discipline Students' Off-Campus Cyberbullying Of Classmates, Douglas E. Abrams
Faculty Publications
The American Medical Association, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have identified bullying in the public elementary and secondary schools as a "public health problem". This article explains the schools' comprehensive authority, consistent with the First Amendment, to impose discipline on cyberbullies, by suspension or expulsion if necessary. Ever since Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District (1969), the Supreme Court's First Amendment decisions have granted the schools authority to discipline student speech that causes, or reasonably threatens, (1) "substantial disruption of or material interference with school …