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By Michelle Ball, California Education Attorney for Students since 1995 Summer often can be a very different time for parents as school year woes fade away.  However, despite the new schedule, with kids at home, summer vacations, and other activities, parents should use the summer to make the upcoming school year more productive, for themselves and their kids. Parents should try some of the below items (aka a short special education checklist) to make next year easier: Organize 1)  Put   student special education and other records into date order with the most current on top. 2)  Three-hole punch them and insert into a 3 ring binder. 3)  Separate by year (e.g. put dividers between school years). 4)  Tab key documents (IEPs, assessments, etc.) for easy reference, e.g. at IEP (Individualized Education Program) meetings. Compare 1)  Now that the records are in order, they should be reviewed and compared to see what is amiss and whether regressio...

By Michelle Ball, California Education Attorney for Students since 1995 If a student goes through a school expulsion hearing in California and are unsatisfied with the results (e.g. they lose and are expelled), they must act quickly to appeal the expulsion decision. Per California Education Code section 48919 , within 30 days of the decision by the Board of Education, an appeal must be filed with the local County Board of Education.  So, if you are in Sacramento the appeal would be lodged with the Sacramento County Board of Education, Woodland would go to the Yolo County Board of Education, Roseville with the Placer County Board of Education, and so on. The date of the decision for purposes of calculating the thirty day expulsion appeal timeline usually begins the date the Board of Education met and made their recommendation in the student expulsion matter.  If a family is in a District where the Board of Education assigns the expulsion hearing to a panel, the decision is...

By Michelle Ball, California Education Attorney for Students since 1995 This week, the California Court of Appeals, Second District, issued a decision in the matter of Yu v. University of La Verne .  This case, involving a private college and law school, is very interesting and explores the free speech rights of college students.  It also may be applied outside of its limited forum (private university) in the future. Yu involved law student Katrina Yu who was punished for alleged plagiarism and academic dishonesty when she submitted an assignment which contained verbatim internet content.  The assignment also contained content alleged to have been copied from another student.  In May of 2010, Yu and three other law students were informed that they were being investigated for plagiarism and academic dishonesty.  While the other university students involved negotiated an unknown outcome, Yu took her matter to a three panel hearing within La Verne. After the ...

By Michelle Ball, California Education Attorney for Students since 1995 There are so many special education resources for parents, I thought I would briefly explain just a few and provide links for parent use. 1)   OAH- Office of Administrative Hearings :  This is a very critical agency in California for parents.  OAH is where parents file due process hearing requests to attempt to resolve special education placement, service, FAPE (Free Appropriate Public Education), and other special education issues.  Information on how to proceed, and even a searchable opinion database  can be accessed at their site. 2)  CDE - Procedural Safeguards Referral Service :  This is the branch of the CDE (California Department of Education) which takes complaints for failure to implement an IEP, procedural failures of districts and other district issues. 3)    OSEP- the Office of Special Education Programs :  OSEP is a branch of the United States Department...

By Michelle Ball, California Education Attorney for Students since 1995 As a California expulsion lawyer, I frequently meet with parents regarding pending school expulsions.  One of the questions which often comes up is whether, if the parent removed the student from the school or district prior to the expulsion hearing, the school district would still have jurisdiction to expel?  Yes.  A school expulsion hearing cannot be avoided by running or disappearing. Once an expellable act is alleged to have occurred and an expulsion hearing is pending, even if a student moves out of state, the expulsion hearing may still proceed.  Not going to the hearing does not avoid the consequences no matter how much we wish that were so.  Additionally, when the student is enrolled somewhere else, their discipline records will follow them and they may be refused admission. If a parent has committed to not returning a student with a pending expulsion hearing to a school distric...