When are educators required to report suspicions of child abuse and neglect as mandatory reporters? Are unsubstantiated rumors enough to create a reasonable suspicion of child abuse? Ready to hear Chris get on his soapbox? Today, we're covering a fascinating case for all educators, especially teachers. This is the kind of thing that anyone in a school setting could easily encounter. This is a case of a school counselor who was informed by a student about a possible inappropriate relationship between a teacher and another student, but that counselor didn’t report it to her supervisors or to child protective services. Well, some more things came to light. She got fired. She filed a lawsuit. And the court said some… interesting things about all of it. Today's case is Small v Streater Township High School District. We also talk about a recent case out of Virginia, NCAA v. Shenandoah County School Board, in which a court held that students' First Amendment rights to be free from compelled speech were violated when students were required to wear school uniforms with a highly symbolic name, "Stonewall Jackson Generals," after the school district reinstated that name following a protracted conflict in the community.

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Need some education law content for your courses or professional development? We have a Teaching Guide! You can check it out at our website, ⁠ChalkandGavel.com⁠.

We'd also greatly appreciate it if you would consider supporting Chalk & Gavel by becoming a subscriber on Patreon. Your support will help us continue to deliver the education law content you want to hear! ⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/chalkandgavel⁠

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Keywords: Mandatory Reporter, Child Abuse, Teachers, Labor and Employment, Contract Termination, Due Process, First Amendment,

#educationlaw #k12 #podcast #ChalkandGavel #Teachers

When can a school, consistent with the First Amendment, non-renew an employee for their speech? What happens when the High School Football coach doesn’t like his daughter’s middle school social studies curriculum? Are you ready for some... facts that have nothing to do with football? While we're great at talking about sports, this case has nothing to do with football and everything to do with free speech. Our case today is a recent decision from Massachusetts regarding a football coach who had issues with his daughter’s middle school social studies curriculum, which led to conversations, emails, and ultimately, more significant problems, such as his non-renewal. This is the case of Flynn v. Forrest. We also discuss a recent decision in South Carolina NAACP v. Weaver, regarding South Carolina's divisive concepts law.

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Need some education law content for your courses or professional development? We have a Teaching Guide! You can check it out at our website, ⁠ChalkandGavel.com⁠.

We'd also greatly appreciate it if you would consider supporting Chalk & Gavel by becoming a subscriber on Patreon. Your support will help us continue to deliver the education law content you want to hear! ⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/chalkandgavel⁠

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Keywords: Free Speech, First Amendment, Teachers, Parental Advocacy, Labor and Employment, Nonrenewal

#educationlaw #k12 #podcast #ChalkandGavel #FreeSpeech #Teachers

When can schools expel a student for lying? What happens when a student’s initial lie snowballs into a tangled web of police reports, intimidation, and false accusations? We’ve talked about smoking in the girls’ room, but what about vaping in the girls’ room? In this episode, we bring TLO into the 21st century. TLO was about smoking in the girls' room, but what happens when a student is accused of vaping in the girls' room? And then what happens when the student makes a bad situation worse by lying, accusing a teacher of impropriety, and intimidating a fellow student? This is the case of Ashton v. Okemos Public Schools. This one has a bit of everything: First Amendment free speech claims, Fourth Amendment reasonable search and seizure, Fourteenth Amendment procedural and substantive due process, lies, intrigue, a police investigation, you name it! We also provide a quick update to Texas's Ten Commandments law, which is very similar to Louisiana's law that we talked about in Episode 51, though of course, everything has to be bigger in Texas.

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Need some education law content for your courses or professional development? We have a Teaching Guide! You can check it out at our website, ⁠ChalkandGavel.com⁠.

We'd also greatly appreciate it if you would consider supporting Chalk & Gavel by becoming a subscriber on Patreon. Your support will help us continue to deliver the education law content you want to hear! ⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/chalkandgavel⁠

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Keywords: Vaping, Student Rights, Lies, Police Investigations, Religion in Schools, Ten Commandments

#educationlaw #k12 #podcast #ChalkandGavel #StudentRights #DontVapeInSchools #TenCommandments