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Portfolio Artifact #3

Jade DeLile

College of Southern Nevada

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Scenario

A middle school student, Ray Knight, was suspended for three days due to too many

unexcused absences. The school districts protocol, when it comes to suspending a student, is that

the school is required to notify the students’ parents through telephone notification and a mailed

notice. The school only sent a notice, via student, which the student promptly tossed out and

neglected to show his parents, so they had no knowledge of the suspension. During Ray’s

suspension, he was accidently shot at a friend’s house. The parents want to pursue liability

charges against the school district and its officials.

Pro Support

Ray’s parents could have defensible grounds to pursue liability charges against the school

district and its officials due to the violation of the Due Process Clause. The Fourteenth

Amendment prohibits the state from depriving anyone from “any person of life, liberty, or

property, without due process of law.” In the case, Graham v. Knutzen, 351 F. Supp. 642 (D.

Neb. 1972), the school system failed to inform the parents of the suspended student or a fair

proper hearing, and the courts agreed that the school system failed to inform the parents. This

case would definitely be beneficial to Ray’s parents’, as it would support the fact that the school

district did not properly inform Ray’s parents of his suspension.

In the Goss v. Lopez (1975) case, the courts felt that students facing suspension should at

the minimum be given notice and offered some kind of hearing, which would also support Ray’s

parents’ accusations that the school did not follow proper procedures in regard to a suspended

student. The three-judge district court determined that students encountering a suspension from

a public school has the right to due process, and that a student must be provided with oral or

written notice of their charges and receive a chance to present his account. In this scenario, the
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school district did not provide Ray’s parents with a proper notice, and thus, was in violation of

the Fourteenth Amendment. Since the school did not properly inform the parents, the school

should be liable for any incidents involving the suspended student that occurs outside of school,

because it could be treated as the student being under the schools supervision when the incident

occurred, as that’s where Ray was thought to be.

Con Support

The school district could argue that they should not be liable if something were to happen

to a student off-campus, as the Calandri v. Ione Unified School Dist. (1963) case proved that

schools would not be held liable if a student’s injury occurs off school property. Thus, the courts

reaffirmed that school districts must exercise reasonable care in supervising their students while

the students are on school premises. The court believed that a school will not be able to foresee

that students will take advantage of having no supervision once off of school campus, and

therefore any off-campus injury is unforeseeable in the eyes of the law.

Hoyem v. Manhattan Beach City Sch. Dist. (1978) case also concurred with the decision

that schools should not be held liable if a student is injured off-campus. In this case, a student

snuck out of school and was hit by a motorist four blocks away from the school. The plaintiff in

this case sued the school district for its negligence and was injured while he was supposed to be

supervised by the school staff. The court ruled that the school would not be liable for the

plaintiff’s injuries as it happened outside of school, and to make a school liable for any injuries

occurring off-campus would be adding more responsibilities to schools, which the court felt that

that would be taking it “too far.” Another case that is related to this is Klein v. Smith, 635

F.Supp. 1440 (Dist. Me. 1986) case where the court believed that a school cannot punish a

student for practicing free speech outside of school and school hours, so in this scenario, the
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school would have no control on what happened to Ray since the incident occurred off-campus

and outside of school hours.

Conclusion

In my opinion, I think that the school district would be in favor due to the fact that the

incident occurred off-campus and that the school gave some sort of notification to Ray notifying

his parents of his suspension, which could be in the scope of providing Ray due process. Even

though Ray’s parents could argue that the district failed to provide due process for Ray (See

Graham v. Knutzen, 351 F. Supp. 642 (D. Neb. 1972) and Goss v. Lopez (1975)), the district

could argue that due process was given to Ray in the form of a written notification that was given

to him, and since Ray discarded that notification, then that meant that he denied a proper hearing.

The school should not be liable for any incidents that occur outside of school (See Calandri v.

Ione Unified School Dist. (1963)) and since Ray knew that he was suspended from school, he

should know that any activities done off-campus would be his responsibility if anything were to

happen (See Hoyem v. Manhattan Beach City Sch. Dist. (1978)). In sum, I think that the courts

would side with the district, even though Ray’s parents have every right to sue the district for

violating their Fourteenth Amendment right of the Due Process Clause.

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References

Calandri v. Ione Unified School Dist. (1963, August 22). Retrieved from

https://law.justia.com/cases/california/court-of-appeal/2d/219/542.html

First Amendment Schools: The Five Freedoms - Court Case. (2018, September 24). Retrieved

from http://www.firstamendmentschools.org/freedoms/case.aspx?id=1674

Goss v. Lopez. (n.d.). Oyez. Retrieved September 24, 2018, from

https://www.oyez.org/cases/1974/73-898

Graham v. Knutzen, 351 F. Supp. 642 (D. Neb. 1972). (1972, October 13). Retrieved from

https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/351/642/2594916/

Hoyem v. Manhattan Beach City Sch. Dist. (1978, October 25). Retrieved from

https://law.justia.com/cases/california/supreme-court/3d/22/508.html