Example research essay topic: Drug Testing Court Cases - 1,064 words

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... for more than 10 days, which is a change in education placement that involves the EHA and the Rehabilitation Act. Schools that receive federal funding have additional requirements placed on them due to the enactment of Public Law 94 - 142, the Education of All Handicapped Children Act (EHA) in 1975. One of the major changes is that the handicapped child and his parents are to be notified of any change in the students educational placement. In the court case of Stuart v Nappi, the ruling was that the IEP team must meet to consider the childs need before an expulsion or the change of placement of the handicapped child takes place. In the Honig v Doe (1988), case the district court clarified the Eha's stay-put provision, which states that handicapped students may not be unilaterally excluded for dangerous conduct resulting from their handicap and must remain in the current educational placement while their program is being reconsidered.

Here are the guidelines that an educator should comply with when considering a suspension or expulsion of a handicapped student: 1. The use of expulsion as a means of changing placement must be made after a team of experts considers the childs needs. 2. Expulsion is a change of placement. 3. Handicapped students may not be excluded for more than 10 days without exhausting the due process procedures of the EHA, except where extreme dangerousness is proven to the court. 4.

For suspensions of more than 10 days, additional procedures should be followed: An IEP team must determine if the students behavior is related to the handicap, if so, the IEP must be revised to reflect the change of placement. When the behavior is not related to the handicap, then the school officials are to follow the same procedures established for regular students. 5. In an emergency when the student is endangering himself or other, the school has the authority to remove the child from school immediately. The IEP team must convene as soon as possible after an emergency removal to determine further appropriate action.

The local districts due process must be followed. 6. Discipline problems that an IEP team is able to anticipate may be addressed on an individual basis in the childs IEP (pg 30 - 31). When dealing with expulsion and suspension of regular students, the court case of Goss v Lopez (1975) placed limits on school administrators. The U. S.

Supreme court held that before for a student could be suspended he must be given verbal or a written statement of the infraction, an explanation of all the evidence the infraction was denied, and a hearing where the student would be allowed to verbalize his side of the story. These are the requirement of a short-term suspension of 10 days or less. In the case of a long-term suspension, this is usually in the school district jurisdiction and the state statues will control the procedures. The major difference is that a written notice must be sent to the parent by registered or certified mail, and as the book states, you might also want to send one by regular mail in case of refusal to receive. The notice should contain this information. 2.

The specific charges against the student; 4. The nature of the evidence supporting the charges; 5. The date, time, and place where the hearing will be held; 6. A copy of the procedures that will be followed at the hearing; and 7.

A reminder of the applicable rights for the student and parents, which may include right to counsel, a copy of the hearing transcript, and a presentation of witnesses and cross-examination of hostile witnesses (pg. 36). There are two common errors when dealing with suspension, and they are not giving the student due process or too much due process and the other is treating the suspension like a criminal trial. These standards do not apply in a school setting because it is an administrative process. There is still one issue that needs to be discussed and that is drug testing.

Urinalysis testing has not been a method of choice by the courts and that is because it is the equivalent of a nude search as noted in the case of Odenheim v. Carlstadt-East Rutherford Regional School District and again in Able v. Ford due to the necessity of students disrobing in the process. It was also found that the school board policy provided for suspension of students who were found to be positive.

Urinalysis can be used if it is done in a way that does not strip a student of his / her dignity and it has to meet the standard of reasonableness as in the case of Shall v Tippecanoe School Corporation. Students were allowed to go into the bathroom where the toilet water had been colored and do the test with a monitor standing outside the door. The parents were required to sign a consent form that was provided by the school board. The school had also made up a list of consequences that would be implemented for positive test results. The reasons that the court decided that the testing was reasonable was because of the drug problems in the school. It also stated that because it was given to athletes the level of privacy was decreased, students were given prior knowledge of the test, and the results of the test were not going to be used as evidence.

There are many other court cases dealing with drug testing of high school students, and they all tend to have different opinions and rulings of what is acceptable and what is not. I feel that a school should weigh all the consequences before implementing a drug-testing plan. In conclusion, I find these court cases to be informative when dealing with students and their First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights. I feel it to be in the best interest of all teachers to be current on court cases that deal with teachers, students, and their rights. Keeping current on these laws and court cases provides substantial information and justification for both teachers and school districts when dealing with freedom of speech, student publications, search and seizure, and discipline of Special Education students, to name a few. The one thing in this book that was new and informative to me was the reasonableness standard and reasonable suspicion.

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Research essay sample on Drug Testing Court Cases