Education Law Commons^™

States Have Long Tried To Ban Ideas From The Classroom: The Current Road Brings A Fresh Evil, Leonard Niehoff

Other Publications

Efforts by state and local officials to ban ideas and books from public school classrooms are nothing new. Recent attempts to do so, however, have a uniquely pernicious characteristic. The current wave of bans doesn’t just seek to censor thoughts or words; it seeks to censor identity.

Masks, Mayhem & The Future Of Disability Rights In Schools, Claire Raj, Crystal Grant

Faculty Scholarship

Disability rights took center stage in the recent battles over universal mask mandates in public schools. Pro-mask advocates argued that universal mask policies were necessary to ensure equal access to education under two different federal disability statutes, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and the Americans with Disabilities Act. Opponents argued universal masking was an infringement on personal liberty and uncalled for by either law. Courts responded with a great deal of confusion that resulted in disparate legal outcomes for cases with essentially the same facts. This confusion, however, is not new—it is rooted in decades of doctrinally …

Investment Bankers And Inclusive Corporate Leadership, Afra Afsharipour

Seattle University Law Review

Few major deals happen without the engagement and advice of investment bankers. Whether a company is undertaking an initial public offering or engaging in a large merger or acquisition deal, investment bankers play a central role in advising corporate executives. Successful investment bankers are devoted to cultivating relationships with executives. And these relationships place bankers in a position to earn tens of millions in fees for their advisory and service roles in connection with corporate dealmaking. Investment bankers’ constant endeavors to nurture relationships with executives, while also maximizing their own ability to enhance fees, commonly leads to allegations of double-dealing, …

Selective Patronage, Omari Scott Simmons

Seattle University Law Review

Contemporary academic corporate governance narratives have a blind spot. They focus on institutions, rules, regulations, processes, procedures, intermediaries, and market forces. Yet, missing in this narrative, is the impact of corporate leadership. Ignoring the “black box” of corporate leadership, particularly individual actors, renders an incomplete descriptive assessment as well as potential miscalculations. The examination of key historical figures and their corporate activism provides an important lens through which to identify potential challenges and opportunities related to the contemporary ESG movement.

Generally, this essay examines corporate leadership’s potential to address socio-political issues through the prism of Civil Rights Movement activism. Specifically, …

Reframing The Dei Case, Veronica Root Martinez

Seattle University Law Review

Corporate firms have long expressed their support for the idea that their organizations should become more demographically diverse while creating a culture that is inclusive of all members of the firm. These firms have traditionally, however, not been successful at improving demographic diversity and true inclusion within the upper echelons of their organizations. The status quo seemed unlikely to move, but expectations for corporate firms were upended after the #MeToo Movement of 2017 and 2018, which was followed by corporate support of the #BlackLivesMatter Movement in 2020. These two social movements, while distinct in many ways, forced firms to rethink …

Women In Shareholder Activism, Sarah C. Haan

Seattle University Law Review

Even a cursory review of the history of American environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) shareholder activism reveals the presence of women leaders. This Article sketches some of this history and interrogates the role of women in the shareholder activism movement. That movement typically has involved claims by minority shareholders to corporate power; activists are nearly always on the margins of power, though minority shareholders may, collectively, represent a majority interest. This Article ascribes women’s leadership in shareholder activism to their longstanding position as outsiders to corporate organization. Women’s participation in shaping corporate policy—even from the margins—has provided women with …

#Metoo And The Corporation In Popular Culture, Brenda Cossman

Seattle University Law Review

#MeToo’s initial virtual explosion in the fall of 2017 was very much about Hollywood, with famous actresses speaking out against famous producers, media moguls and celebrities, exposing the ubiquity of sexual harassment and sexual violence in and around the entertainment industry. Since then, #MeToo has made its way into Hollywood representations without much irony. Films and television shows have explicitly taken up the #MeToo themes, exploring issues of sexual harassment and violence and its afterlives. Many television shows, from the relaunched version of Murphy Brown to Brooklyn Nine-Nine to The Good Fight have incorporated #MeToo themes into episodes exploring the …

Woke Capital Revisited, Jennifer S. Fan

Seattle University Law Review

Inclusive corporate leadership is now at the forefront of discussions related to corporate governance. Two corporate theories help to explain the rise in prominence of diversity, equity, and inclusion (“DEI”) efforts in corporate leadership. First, an expanded definition of corporate purpose which elevated the idea of the importance of stakeholders, contributed to the momentum from business and legal quarters for broader corporate inclusion. Second, the increasing publicness of corporations—the social expectation of how large, typically public corporations should act given their position of power—also led to corporations becoming more active in the DEI space. It is against this backdrop that …

Army Commander’S Role—The Judge, Jury, & Prosecutor For The Article 15, Anthony Godwin

Seattle University Law Review

Service members in the armed forces are bound by a different set of rules when compared to other U.S. citizens. Some of the normal safeguards and protections that civilians enjoy are much more restrictive for military service members, and this is generally for a good reason. Such restrictions are partly due to the complex demands and needs of the United States military. Congress and the President have entrusted military commanders with special powers that enable them to handle minor violations of law without needing to go through a full judicial proceeding. Non-judicial punishments (NJP), also known as Article 15s, are …

A Synthesis Of The Science And Law Relating To Eyewitness Misidentifications And Recommendations For How Police And Courts Can Reduce Wrongful Convictions Based On Them, Henry F. Fradella

Seattle University Law Review

The empirical literature on perception and memory consistently demonstrates the pitfalls of eyewitness identifications. Exoneration data lend external validity to these studies. With the goal of informing law enforcement officers, prosecutors, criminal defense attorneys, judges, and judicial law clerks about what they can do to reduce wrongful convictions based on misidentifications, this Article presents a synthesis of the scientific knowledge relevant to how perception and memory affect the (un)reliability of eyewitness identifications. The Article situates that body of knowledge within the context of leading case law. The Article then summarizes the most current recommendations for how law enforcement personnel should—and …

Ambivalent Advocates: Why Elite Universities Compromised The Case For Affirmative Action, Jonathan Feingold

Faculty Scholarship

“The end of affirmative action.” The headline is near. When it arrives, scholars will explain that a controversial set of policies could not withstand unfriendly doctrine and less friendly Justices. This story is not wrong. But it is incomplete. Critically, this account masks an underappreciated source of affirmative action’s enduring instability: elite universities, affirmative action’s formal champions, have always been ambivalent advocates.
/="/">
/="/">Elite universities are uniquely positioned to shape legal and lay opinions about affirmative action. They are formal defendants in affirmative action litigation and objects of public obsession. And yet, schools like Harvard and the University of …

How Scotus's Recent Decision On The Cheerleader Case Impacts Public School Students' Due Process Rights For Their Off-Campus Conduct, Abby Efron

St. Mary's Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Forging A Future Title Ix, Naomi M. Mann

Faculty Scholarship

Title IX is in transition. Fifty years after its passage, Title IX is at the center of multiple culture wars, notably those around the definition of sex¹ and the contours of due process² in schools. Since 2011, the federal Department of Education (“ED”) has issued multiple guidance documents, containing widely divergent obligations for schools.³ In the last decade, the meaning of Title IX has been highly contested, appearing sometimes more dependent on the administration in power than on the statute’s text and purpose.⁴ This pendulum swing has diverted attention away from Title IX’s core goal: equal …

Title Ix’S Unrealized Potential To Prevent Sexual Violence, Katharine B. Silbaugh

Faculty Scholarship

The mandate of Title IX is equality in educational opportunities. If educational institutions could prevent sexual assaults from occurring, they would more fully ensure that students are not limited in their ability to benefit from the school’s educational programs. However, Title IX administration on college campuses still focuses far more on post-assault infrastructure than on assault prevention.

Yet with the ever-increasing particularity of the assault response requirements emanating from the Department of Education (“DOE”)2 and courts, Title IX jurisprudence has strayed too far from this basic purpose: to ensure that students in federally funding schools are not denied or limited …

Title Ix And The Challenges Of Educating For Equality, Linda C. Mcclain

Faculty Scholarship

Educating for equality to foster practicing equality must be a vital task for the next fifty years of Title IX. It is also a task that fits into the mission and expertise of schools as educational institutions. I use “educating for equality” as shorthand for the role of schools in preparing children, adolescents, and college students to participate in and build a world in which—to echo Title IX’s “37 words that changed everything”¹—“No person in the United States, shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to …

Affirmative Action After Sffa, Jonathan Feingold

Faculty Scholarship

In SFFA v. Harvard (SFFA), the Supreme Court further restricted a university’s right to consider the racial identity of individual applicants during admissions. The ruling has spawned considerable confusion regarding a university’s ongoing ability to pursue racial diversity, racial inclusion, and other equality-oriented goals—whether through “raceconscious” or “race-neutral” means. To assist institutions attempting to navigate the ruling, this article outlines a set of key legal rights and responsibilities that universities continue to possess following SFFA.

529 Plans And School Choice, Victoria J. Haneman

Scholarly Works

Some politicians believe that market-based approaches to education will meaningfully reshape public education in the United States. Advocates of school choice insist that competition for students will improve academic outcomes, drive innovation and improvement, and reduce political interference in the education system. Critics believe that there is little empirical support for any of these claims and fear that school choice policies worsen the problem of educational inequality. Although consumer choice is appealing, making an informed choice requires parents to navigate complicated application processes and transportation requirements, which may prove insurmountable to low-income families. The net effect of this is that …

Decoupling Property And Education, Nicole Stelle Garnett

Journal Articles

Over the past several years, the landscape of K–12 education policy has shifted dramatically, thanks in part to increasing prevalence of parental-choice policies, including intra- and inter-district public school choice, charter schools, and private-school choice policies like vouchers and (most recently) universal education savings accounts. These policies decouple property and education by delinking students’ educational options from their residential addresses. The wisdom and efficacy of parental choice as education policy is hotly debated. This Essay takes a step back from these education-policy debates and examines the underappreciated fact that decoupling property and education also advances at least economic development goals. …

"Covid-19 Was The Publicist For Homeschooling" And States Need To Finally Take Homeschooling Regulations Seriously Post-Pandemic, Kristia Hoffman

FIU Law Review

Homeschooling was rapidly growing in the U.S. even before COVID-19. The pandemic accelerated this growth by quickly exposing nearly every American family to homeschooling in some form. The pandemic has ushered in a new age of homeschooling characterized by flexibility, technology, collaboration, and alternative forms of schooling beyond the traditional parent-teaching-child framework. Although the Supreme Court has never recognized a fundamental right of parents to homeschool their children, it has repeatedly recognized that parents have the right to direct their children’s education and to choose to educate them in the way they deem fit. There is debate as to what …

Unmasking The Power Dynamic Between Local School Boards And The State Executive Branch: Implications For Future Local School Safety Protocols, Karla Michelle Cejas

FIU Law Review

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought attention to the government’s power in controlling the operation of public schools. The legal and political differences among local school boards and the State’s COVID policies are exemplified in media headline battles pertaining to school reopening and the Governor’s so called “anti-mask mandate.” The State capitalized on its emergency powers at the expense of providing local school boards with the autonomy to enact district-wide protective measures. Local school boards have faced several challenges in arguing against State Emergency Orders including a difficulty with proving state compulsion to comply with its directives, overly broad statutory language …

Connecting The Dots: Immigration Policy And Access To Higher Education For Refugees In France, Isabella Amaro Varas

CISLA Senior Integrative Projects

Since 2016, the increasing number of refugees in Europe accelerated the development of national and regional policies to determine their rights and access to resources. Against this backdrop, the strong politicization of migration, and the recent financial crises, refugees' access to welfare has “become a key area of concern across European democracies” (Lafleur et al. 2020). Considering public education programs as a pillar of social policy agendas in this region, this study examines French policy in order to answer the following questions: How do French immigration and education policies converge to determine refugees’ access to higher education in France? What …

Inclusion Of Visually Impaired And Deaf Students In Kenya: A Call For Action, Edwin O. Abuya, Jane W. Githinji

Washington International Law Journal

Drawing on field data, this Article reviews the experiences of visually impaired and deaf students (VIDS) in select universities in Kenya. The paper argues that, unlike able bodied students, these learners face discrimination in these institutions. The Article focuses on three spaces where VIDS are excluded: the admission process, the learning, and the examination environments. To counter the unfair treatment, the paper proposes three solutions that VIDS and stakeholders should consider. These are consistent with legal requirements on access to education by VIDS. Firstly, course instructors should be robustly engaged with. Further, universities should provide adequate and timely information should …

The Magic Of Fintech? Insights For A Regulatory Agenda From Analyzing Student Loan Complaints Filed With The Cfpb, Matthew Adam Bruckner, Christopher J. Ryan

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

This Article looks at consumer complaints about student loan lenders and servicers from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB’s) consumer complaint database. Using a novel dataset drawn from 30,678 complaints filed against 212 student loan companies, we analyze consumers’ subjective views about whether traditional or fintech student loan lenders and servicers provide a better customer experience. Overall, we find that consumers initiate far fewer complaints against fintech lenders than traditional lenders. But we find that fintech lenders are 28 times more likely than traditional lenders to receive complaints for making confusing or misleading advertisements. Our data also show that complaints …

Indoctrination By Elimination: Why Banning Critical Race Theory In Public Schools Is Unconstitutional, Emma Postel

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

This Note argues that Texas public school students’ First Amendment Rights have been violated by the passage of Senate Bill 3 (SB 3), which bans the teaching of Critical Race Theory (CRT) in K–12 public schools. The First Amendment is violated here because (1) students have a First Amendment right to speech, and this law bans protected speech; (2) students have a right to receive information, and this ban prevents them from receiving information; and (3) schools are meant to be the marketplace of ideas for students and banning CRT amounts to unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination. This Note does not suggest …

Tenure In New York, Matthew W. Finkin

Buffalo Law Review

No abstract provided.

Education Administration In Federal Indian Law: Learning From A Colonial Project Turned Tool Of Liberation, Ariel Liberman, Douglas L. Waters Jr.

American Indian Law Journal

While statistics tend to focus on the difficulties facing tribal education, this article endeavors to look at the matter with fresh eyes. The federal administrative paradigm governing tribal schools has gone from a tool of cultural genocide to a mechanism for empowerment. A survey of recent governmental reforms demonstrates an embrace of the diversity of Indigenous communities, an interest in empowering students through learning, and an acknowledgement of a history of active disenfranchisement. This is ever-evolving federal-tribal relationship shows the administrative state’s capacity for dealing with greatly nuanced community needs and for tailor-making reforms to achieve concrete goals, even if …

Abusing Discretion: The Battle For Childhood In Schools, Hannah Dodson

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

For too many children the schoolhouse doors become a point of entry into the criminal justice system. Children of color are the most likely to suffer from this phenomenon. The presence of policing in schools is a key contributor to this “school-to-prison pipeline.” This Note argues that broad, discretionary mandates for school resource officers (SROs) promote biased law enforcement that impacts Black girls in different and specific ways. I contend that SRO mandates can be effectively limited by strategically bolstering community organizing efforts with impact litigation.

The Merit Of Inclusion: A Policy Review Examining The Convergence Of Special Education And Inclusions Policies With Compensatory Medicaid Policies In The Wake Of The Covid-19 Pandemic, Corbyn Baggett

Capstone Experience: Master of Public Health

On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) formally recognized the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak as a global pandemic. This global issue compelled governments to announce careful virus containing policies in order to prevent further spread and control of the disease. Although it has been proven that measures like social isolation could aid in scaling the spread of illness, the resulting extended school closures that occurred in response to an increased number of COVID-19 outbreaks posed significant challenges for all students, but especially those students with special needs. The unpredictable nature of COVID-19 at the outset of the pandemic …

Why A New Deal Must Address The Readability Of U.S. Consumer Contracts, Michael L. Rustad

Cardozo Law Review

United States companies are increasingly drafting consumer contracts that are complex and unreadable, thus making it difficult for many Americans to comprehend terms of use that apply to goods and services. Many U.S. companies are creating terms of use that are, in effect, rights-foreclosure schemes. Many consumer agreements cap damages at a nominal amount, disclaim all warranties, limit remedies, and impose mandatory arbitration clauses and class action waivers. U.S. courts enforce these unfair mass-market contracts with few exceptions. My proposal for a New Deal for Consumer Contracts, as described in this Article, would impose a more exacting readability standard, enforcing …

Science, Technology, Engineering, And Mathematics (Stem) Project-Based Learning (Pbl) Education: A New Mexico Case Study For Equity And Inclusion, Kimberly A. Scheerer

Teacher Education, Educational Leadership & Policy ETDs

This research addresses how student participation in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) project-based learning (PBL) education activities encourages underrepresented minority student achievement in STEM career field trajectories. Seven New Mexico high school counselors and 12 STEM organization personnel were interviewed during this study. Their responses represent the nuanced professional voices where New Mexico public education intersects with STEM student interest and cultural influence.

For students, STEM PBL can foster deep integration across educational disciplines and enhance STEM career trajectory interest and readiness. STEM education converged with PBL methodologies has the ability to leverage community support while broadening student networks. …