— In Tennessee, the Court of Appeals of Tennessee, affirmed the dismissal of a case involving an injury to a student that both the trial court and the appellate court declared to be “an unfortunate, but unforeseeable accident.” The injury to the student occurred when “when a classmate, who was not aiming at the injured student, threw a pencil that ricocheted off a surface and hit the student in the eye.” The injury was a serious one. The pencil “hit (the injured student’s) eye, fully penetrating her eyeball. (The injured student) underwent multiple reconstructive surgeries to try to remedy her injuries. (But the injured student’s) vision was permanently impaired, and she will be required to seek continual medical treatment to manage her injuries.” The injured student filed a lawsuit “asserting that the classroom teacher was negligent and that the School System was, accordingly, vicariously liable.” The governing rule of law states that “a risk is foreseeable if a reasonable person could foresee the probability of its occurrence or if the person was on notice that the likelihood of danger to the party to whom is owed a duty is probable.” The appellate court agreed with the lower court that the student “was not injured by an inherently dangerous instrumentality but by a pencil, which a high school student can be expected to wield without teacher supervision…(and that) “a mechanical pencil is obviously capable of inflicting injury, but is not, in and of itself, a dangerous instrumentality and is used routinely in classrooms.” Therefore, because neither the teacher nor the school district had “sufficient notice to anticipate that (the injured student) would be injured in this way… circumstances of this case present a freakish and unfortunate accident that simply could not have been foreseen.” Hammers v. Clarksville-Montgomery County Schools
— In Texas, officials in the Austin ISD are “asking Waymo to fix safety issues after its cars pass stopped school buses.” Texas law requires vehicles to remain fixed in place when a school bus stops. “Waymo said there was a software issue that led to the AVs passing the school buses, but during the incidents, the AV only proceeded when no people were in front of the car. It also said it worked quickly to fix the software issue.”
— In Arizona, officials in Coconino County are deploying a $500,000 grant to improve campus safety. The focus of the safety upgrades falls upon “county’s county’s Accommodation District (which) serves students who face significant academic and personal challenges, including youth involved in the juvenile justice system and students experiencing trauma or instability. Many come from communities with high rates of poverty, and half of all students live within the Navajo or Hopi tribal nations.” The Superintendent announced that the grant “allows us to address long-standing security gaps with a comprehensive, sustainable plan that protects both students and staff.”
— In Virginia, officials in the Charlottesville City Schools “are moving ahead with plans to bring police officers back to campuses next year, and they are revising key documents governing how officers will interact with students.” Despite criticism of the policy from some in the community, the majority of the school board believes that students “should be able to come into school each morning and be focused on learning, and teachers should be focused on teaching; not whether they’re physically safe or whether there are fights or threats or safety incidents.”