Education Law Commons^™

"Student-Initiated" Prayer: Assessing The Newest Initiatives To Return Prayer To The Public Schools, Jessica Smith

Campbell Law Review

Section I of this article discusses the impetus for the recent spate of "student-initiated" prayer statutes, guidelines, and policies. The discussion includes a summary of existing provisions as well as detailed accounts of the history and development of two "student-initiated" prayer efforts. These accounts, which chronicle the development of initiatives in Florida and Mississippi, expose the ruse of "student-initiated" prayer. The accounts demonstrate that regardless of how the initiatives were promoted or disguised, their true purpose was not to protect students' rights of free speech and free exercise but to promote prayer. Section II challenges the new initiatives on constitutional …

Hopwood: Was This The African-American Nightmare Or The African-American Dream?, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Remark: Brown V. Board: Revisited, Michael A. Middleton

Faculty Publications

[T]he Negro needs neither segregated schools nor mixed schools. What he needs is Education. What he must remember is that there is no magic, either in mixed schools or in segregated schools. A mixed school with poor and unsympathetic teachers, with hostile public opinion, and no teaching of truth concerning black folk, is bad. A segregated school with ignorant placeholders, inadequate equipment, poor salaries, and wretched housing, is equally bad. Other things being equal, the mixed school is the broader, more natural basis for the education of all youth. It gives wider contacts; it inspires greater self-confidence; and suppresses the …

New Restrictions On Academic Free Speech: Jeffries V. Harleston Ii, Richard H. Hiers

UF Law Faculty Publications

Notwithstanding academic freedom's venerable and near-sacrosanct place among academicians in the United States today, the Supreme Court first accorded it constitutional status only in the 1950s. The Court did not recognize First Amendment speech rights of public employees generally until 1968. In subsequent years, the Court evolved two separate lines of cases: the one relating to, and generally protective of, academic freedom in public colleges and universities; the other, relating to the speech rights of public school teachers and public employees in other work contexts. The Supreme Court has yet to address the question whether the severely restrictive standards developed …

State Constitutions, School Finance Litigation, And The "Third Wave": From Equity To Adequacy, Michael Heise

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Squeezing Religion Out Of The Public Square- The Supreme Court, Lemon, And The Myth Of The Secular Society, M. G. "Pat" Robertson

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

No abstract provided.

Public Education And The Public Good, Robert S. Alley

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

No abstract provided.

The Wall Crumbles: A Look At The Establishment Clause Rosenberger V. Rector & Visitors Of The University Of Virginia, Paul L. Hicks

West Virginia Law Review

No abstract provided.

State Constitutional Litigation, Educational Finance, And Legal Impact: An Empirical Analysis, Michael Heise

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Court Vs. Educational Standards, Michael Heise

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Ironic State Of Religious Liberty In America, Frederick Mark Gedicks

Mercer Law Review

The constitutionality of organized graduation or classroom prayer in public schools is an issue of continuing controversy in the United States. There are, of course, numerous policy arguments for and against allowing prayer in public schools, but I will be focusing on the constitutional issues and consequently will have rather less to say about policy. (I will disclose, however, that as a matter of policy, I think there are problems with public schools' organizing and sponsoring group prayer as part of graduation ceremonies or classroom activities; it would seem that Mr. Peck, Mr. Sekulow, and I all agree on that, …

Graduation Prayer After Lee V. Weisman: A Cautionary Tale, Stephen B. Pershing

Mercer Law Review

Loudoun County, Virginia, is a lush expanse of fields and rolling hills at the edge of the burgeoning Washington metropolis. Its growing population is heavily white, affluent, and Christian. In 1993, a year after the Supreme Court's decision in Lee v. Weisman, the county not surprisingly became an arena for the resurgence of a familiar prayer in America's public schools.

This Article tells the story of the Loudoun County graduation prayer litigation, and tries to set the case in context. It ponders doctrinal questions from an unabashedly separationist perspective, but it offers words of caution for both sides in the …

The Threat To The American Idea Of Religious Liberty, Robert S. Peck

Mercer Law Review

With the Supreme Court unlikely to overturn its public school prayer decisions, those who seek a greater religious presence in education have launched two complementary strategies intended to expand existing guarantees of school-related worship rights.

The first strategy is a renewed effort to pass a school prayer constitutional amendment utilizing the political muscle that conservative religious interests demonstrated in the 1994 elections and which resulted in the first Republican controlled Congress in forty years. The amendment movement dangerously attempts to authorize the use of government offices for purposes of religious indoctrination. Though previous efforts at authorizing public school prayer through …

Proposed Guidelines For Student Religious Speech And Observance In Public Schools, Jay Alan Sekulow, James Henderson, John Tuskey

Mercer Law Review

The First Amendment to the United States Constitution provides, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion .... " The First Amendment also provides, "Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.. ." Perhaps no question has so bedeviled American courts in this century as that of how to reconcile these two provisions in this nation's public schools. Questions that arise include: Does allowing students to pray, share their faith with other students, or even discuss their religion at the public schools constitute an "establishment of religion?" May public schools go …

Educational Adequacy: A Theory And Its Remedies, William H. Clune

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The Articles in this volume explore a broad range of issues raised by adequacy litigation. This Introduction will summarize the Articles, discuss the theory of adequacy, and explore highlights of the Articles' examination of key aspects of judicial remedies.

Accelerated Education As A Remedy For High-Poverty Schools, William H. Clune

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

High-poverty schools, and the students who attend them, have historically faced substantial challenges in providing and receiving, adequate education. Despite some relief from the courts, school finance remedies that require the redistribution of monetary aid to low-wealth districts have encountered strong political opposition. In this Article, Professor Clune makes a renewed claim for accelerated education as the primary focus of adequacy litigation in school reform cases. He describes the nation's educational condition, in which there exists a disturbing correlation between poverty and low educational outcomes. He then drafts a vision of a comprehensive, school reform remedy, one that emphasizes institutional …

School Finance Adequacy As Vertical Equity, Julie K. Underwood

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In this Article, Dean Underwood explains that school finance cases can be divided into three waves of reform. The first wave involved efforts to use the Federal Equal Protection Clause to overturn financing systems. Litigants in the second wave turned to state equal protection and due process clauses. Finally, the third wave involved the utilization of education clauses in state constitutions as the predominant litigation vehicle. These three waves embody two primary approaches to school finance litigation. The first approach involves a challenge to the adequacy of a state's funding system under either the state or federal equal protection clause, …

Establishing Education Program Inadequacy: The Alabama Example, Martha I. Morgan, Adam S. Cohen, Helen Hershkoff

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The authors draw on their experience as attorneys for a statewide class of plaintiff school children in the liability phase of ongoing public education reform litigation in Alabama to demonstrate the availability of state and nationally recognized standards concerning educational resources (inputs) and results (outputs) that can serve as evidentiary tools for assessing and for establishing a state public education system's failure to satisfy constitutional mandates of educational adequacy. The Article discusses the usefulness and limitations of using such standards as a starting point in a court's constitutional analysis. It suggests an integrated approach that links input and output standards …

Achieving Equity And Excellence In Kentucky Education, C. Scott Trimble, Andrew C. Forsaith

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In this Article, Trimble and Forsaith discuss the landmark Kentucky school finance case, Rose v. Council for Better Education, 790 S.W.2d 186 (Ky. 1989), and the school reform efforts it spawned. In Council for Better Education, the Kentucky Supreme Court held that the state had failed its duty under the state constitution to provide all students with an adequate education, which it defined in terms of seven categories of knowledge and skills students should acquire. The State General Assembly responded with the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA), which significantly boosted state funding as well as established an ambitious accountability system …

Oklahoma School Finance Litigation: Shifting From Equity To Adequacy, Mark S. Grossman

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Article traces the history of Oklahoma school finance litigation from the initial challenge based on funding inequity to a recent lawsuit founded on alleged constitutional inadequacies in the state system. Although the legal challenge based on funding inequity was unsuccessful in the courts, the pendency of the suit helped push the state legislature toward some reforms. The threat of a new lawsuit based on alleged inadequacies in the state school system, together with a serious funding shortfall, propelled a comprehensive education reform plan through the state legislature in 1990. The association of local school boards that led the equity …

Educators Who Drive With No Hands: The Application Of Analytical Concepts Of Corporate Law In Certain Cases Of Educational Malpractice, Cherly L. Wade

San Diego Law Review

This Article focuses on the problem of poorly educated children and how serious misconduct of some educators goes unpunished. The Author argues that civil liability should be imposed if the educator’s actions constitute gross negligence, such as where teachers allow a student to remain in an incorrect and harmful placement. Since the judiciary does not want to intervene in such cases, the Author examines types of decisions in the corporate context in which the court will intervene. The Article explains that the judiciary should apply a form of the business judgment rule and other corporate law principles to help alleviate …

Discrimination In The Education Process Based On Race, Deborah Mayo-Jeffries

North Carolina Central Law Review

No abstract provided.

Constitutional Law — "Words That Injure: Laws That Silence:" Campus Hate Speech Codes And The Threat To American Education, Jeanne M. Craddock

Florida State University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Universities And Other Institutions Of Higher Learning - Recent Judicial Developments

The Journal of Law and Education

No abstract provided.

Civil Rights: A Common And Continuing Struggle, Deval Patrick

Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Brown V. Board Of Education At Forty: Where Are We? Where Do We Go From Here?, Murray Dry

Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice

No abstract provided.

The Progeny Of Lee V. Weisman: Can Student-Invited Prayer At Public School Graduations Still Be Constitutional?, Thomas A. Schweitzer

Brigham Young University Journal of Public Law

No abstract provided.

When All Else Has Failed: Resolving The School Funding Problem, John Dayton

Brigham Young University Education and Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Models For School Board Policy Development: Rationalism, Empiricism And The New Science, Steve Baldridge

Brigham Young University Education and Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Student-To-Student Sexual Harassment And Discrimination, Dennie D. Butterfield

Brigham Young University Education and Law Journal

No abstract provided.