— In Illinois, the Appellate Court of Illinois reversed the dismissal of a teacher, whose Facebook posts were used as the basis for a “for cause” dismissal. The Facebook post, reflecting the growing frustration of the teacher with student behavior and school rules, “mock and disparage students, parents, and the profession of teaching,” contained vulgar speech, alluded to students pejoratively, in a manner that “could undermine the trust and positive role-modeling that must exist between teachers and students.” Even so, the court held that, “the school board’s final administrative decision to dismiss for cause is subject to judicial review.” Reversal was appropriate because, “(Under Illinois law) before a school board can dismiss a tenured teacher for conduct considered remediable, it must first provide the teacher with reasonable written warning and an opportunity to remedy (the behavior).” The conduct of the teacher was remediable, because her “opinions…were expressed in the abstract, as they were not tied to evidence that these things had actually occurred as a result of the plaintiff’s posts…(the) Facebook posts (did not) cause disruption within the student body or an uproar among the faculty, parents, or the community, which was detrimental to discipline or damaged the school’s reputation.” Dierdre Kelleher v. Illinois State Board of Education & Board of Education of Oak Park Elementary School District No. 97
— In Colorado, Denver school officials are experiencing more violence in its schools. In 2020, the Denver school board voted unanimously to end Denver Public Schools’ contract with the Denver Police Department to provide school resource officers. This school year, eight guns have been found on Denver campuses. This month a student was shot and critically injured just outside a high school. Now a former school administrator is urging a return of police under the framework of the PEERS program: Police Establishing Equitable Relationships with Students. PEERS identifies “primary police officers for each school who could respond to calls but also participate in community service projects, guest teach classes, mentor students, and meet monthly with school administrators about neighborhood safety issues.”
— In Texas, an interim Report by the Texas legislature investigating the Uvalde shooting, confirms the connection between school safety and duty of school officials to provide services to children with special needs. According to the Report, despite the growing evidence that the shooter was “identified as at-risk (as a student), he never received special education services and ultimately (dropped) out.”
— In North Carolina, Rowan County has one of the lowest rates in the state for referrals by law enforcement to the juvenile justice system for school-based offenses. Karen South Jones, the Executive Director of the Rowan County Youth Services Bureau and a former member of the Rowan-Salisbury Board of Education, explains that this is because of the, “the high number of incidents which are referred by School Resource Officers to Teen Court or other community-based resources.” “Restorative practices are embedded in Teen Court, an initiative which (allows) young people (to) learn from and move beyond their negative behaviors.”