Disciplinary Placement FAQ - New York

When you chose your NY student's high school, there were likely myriad factors going into that decision. Location, teachers, your student's preferences, and several other considerations all went into that careful choice.

If your student's school has decided to recommend a disciplinary placement for your child, all of that planning can go out of the window in a flash. Unfortunately, it's becoming increasingly common for high school students to experience obstacles that trigger severe disciplinary actions.

These disciplinary actions, which include suspensions, dismissals, and even emergency referrals to alternative education programs, aren't always in your student's best interest. And, worse, they may not even make any sense.

Whether your student has already experienced a disciplinary placement or it seems your school is threatening this type of action, you need to contact Attorney Joseph D. Lento and the Lento Law Firm Team without delay. The Education Defense Team at the Lento Law Firm can help you protect your student from an unwanted alternative education placement in New York! Call today at 888.535.3686 for a consultation.

What Is Alternative Education in New York?

If your child attends a New York high school, the disciplinary program their school participates in is likely the Chancellor's Regulation A-443. This set of procedures outlines the way high schools need to handle removals, suspensions, and other similar disciplinary actions.

Under the Chancellor's Regulation A-443, school districts must provide an opportunity for students to pursue their education even after they've been removed from a school environment for safety, behavior, or academic concerns. The regulations also discuss how long these removals can last, as well as the resources available for these alternative education options.

New York's high school alternative education programs are often referred to as “Alternative Learning Centers.” While their goal is to provide needed support for students who may be struggling in their previous school environments, they often don't have the resources required to fulfill this mission.

If your school has recommended that your student attend an alternative education program, you need to step in at once. Attorney Joseph D. Lento and the Education Defense Team at the Lento Law Firm can help you work to keep your student in your chosen school and negotiate with your school to pursue alternative forms of discipline.

What are the Different Types of Alternative Education Programs in New York?

In New York, if a student is expelled from their high school, they will have a few options to pursue. Here are the general avenues you can take:

1. Initiating due process with your school. Your student has a right to due process, or a specific set of procedures to determine whether expulsion or serious discipline is merited in your student's case. If your student's supposed infraction endangered others at your school or was similarly severe, your school may remove your student from the school environment quickly—but that doesn't mean you can't insist on due process. Contact the Education Defense Team at the Lento Law Firm at once if you don't feel your school allowed you the opportunity to defend your student's case.
2. Attending a NY alternative education program. New York's alternative learning centers can take many forms. Your student may be given a choice, or your school may make a recommendation as to which alternative education setting your student should pursue. For example, your student may be assigned a specific in-person alternative learning center, or you might have to consider online education. Depending on your area and circumstances, several different options could be available to you, under names like Pathways to Graduation, Young Adult Education Centers, Referral Centers for High School Alternatives, and more.
3. Partnering with your school to pursue re-entry. Your school may leave the door open for your student to re-enter (or re-apply to) the school after a specified period of time. However, as we'll discuss later on in this guide, permanent reinstatement at your preferred school is rarer than many expelled students would like to think.
4. GED programs. Finally, if your student does not have an appropriate alternative learning center available to them and their previous school makes it clear re-entry is not an option, they can pursue a General Educational Development program to earn a high school equivalency diploma.

While these may seem like adequate options, here's the scary truth:

If your student's permanent record has any mention of severe or long-term discipline on it — such as expulsion, a stint at an alternative learning center, or a sudden and unplanned pivot to pursuing a GED — that could make it much more difficult than necessary to get into a good college. Admissions teams tend to ask hard questions about these types of disciplinary events. Your student's dream university could consider a disciplinary referral a non-starter.

Attorney Joseph D. Lento and the team at the Lento Law Firm can help your student move past these obstacles and negotiate lesser sanctions with your school. Call 888.535.3686 today to set up a consultation.

My New York High School Has Offered to Set Up a “Rehabilitation Plan” for My Student. What Does That Mean?

One of the supports or interventions your school could offer, in concert with an alternative learning center, is a student rehabilitation plan. This plan should offer your student adequate academic and emotional support to assist your student as they overcome any perceived disciplinary or behavioral issues.

In a vacuum, this type of program is great — laudable, even if these plans provide genuine, unbiased support to students who need help. If your student does not actually require support or if your student has been disciplined without due cause, these types of plans only further strengthen your student's unfairly poor reputation.

Your student's rehabilitation plan will include some version of the following:

1. Plans for ongoing assessment and evaluation of your student
2. Specific recommendations for the type of academic support your student may need
3. Specific indications for interventions to improve your student's alleged problematic behaviors
4. Recommendations for any needed emotional support — e.g., therapy or counseling to help students cope with ostensible depression or anxiety
5. Parameters for dealing with any apparent substance abuse, familial challenges, or any other factors that may have influenced your student's alleged infractions
6. A plan outlining your student's return to school, if your previous school is amenable

If your school has reached out with a plan including any of the above elements, call Attorney Joseph D. Lento and the Student Defense Team at the Lento Law Firm immediately. Your school may try to position this type of plan as a peace offering or a favor they're doing for you and your family. Even if it's sent with good intentions, this type of plan can be harmful for your child. At the very least, you must have Attorney Lento look over this documentation before you move forward with any kind of student rehabilitation plan.

We understand that this is an overwhelming time for you and your child, but time is of the essence — and it can be incredibly easy to accidentally sign something or agree to a plan that makes it harder for your student to go back to their chosen school, or that makes filing an appeal and negotiating with your school more of a challenge than it needs to be. Your best bet is to retain the services of the Student Defense Team at the Lento Law Firm immediately. That way, you can focus on being there for your student, instead of wading through all of these potential legal and academic minefields.

Why Do New York Schools Expel Their Students?

Your school's code of conduct, a document that should be available on your school's website, is a good resource for answering this question in detail. Every school may have its own rubric for determining what merits expulsion.

There are also grounds for expulsion that are likely consistent from school to school. For example, if a high school student is suspected of association with any of the following problematic behaviors, expulsion or at least a suspension may be imminent:

1. Any kind of violent behavior or harm caused to staff or students
2. Possession of controlled substances, drugs, alcohol, or weapons on campus
3. Repeated violations of school regulations, especially after disciplinary actions and warning from your school's staff
4. Harassing or cyberbullying behavior
5. Falsification of school documentation or student records
6. Severe or repeated academic dishonesty (e.g., cheating or plagiarism)
7. Failure to follow school rules on a regular basis
8. Significant academic issues (e.g., failure to progress)

Your school may not consider context or even actually demonstrate that your student is responsible for these problematic behaviors. Instead, your school may recommend a disciplinary placement in a flash, leaving you little time to react or protect your student. That's why you call Attorney Joseph D. Lento and the Lento Law Firm Team to help you with your case.

Are There Any Situations Where a New York High School Can't Expel My Student?

Every school has different regulations, but there are some situations that make it more difficult for a New York high school to recommend expulsion. For example, students with disabilities have rights to education that are protected by federal law. In other cases, schools may not be able to expel students if the recommendation relates to the student's gender, race, religion, or sexual orientation.

This does not necessarily mean your student's in the clear, if the above or similar situations apply in your case. Even if your student is protected from immediate expulsion, your school can still make your student's life very difficult, or seek out a loophole to recommend alternative consequences. Working with Attorney Joseph D. Lento is your student's best way to achieve an optimal outcome.

Can I Appeal My Student's High School Expulsion?

Yes, you can! In fact, one of your first strategies for overturning your student's disciplinary recommendation will be to file an appeal. This can seem intense, as you'll need to pull together a persuasive argument speaking directly to your school's administration. And you'll need to work quickly: Your school may only allow you a very short window of time to file your appeal.

Working with the Education Defense Team at the Lento Law Firm is the best way to work towards success with an appeal. Attorney Joseph D. Lento and the Lento Law Firm Team will help you ensure your file is appealed in a timely manner, and will also assist with any follow-up negotiations.

What are the Downsides of Disciplinary Placements or Alternative Learning Centers?

NY's Alternative Learning Centers are billed as ways to give needed support to students experiencing academic or disciplinary issues. Ideally, this would be the case, but your student won't necessarily have a good experience after their disciplinary placement. And the placement could do them far more harm than good in the long term.

For example:

• Disciplinary placements go on your student's permanent record. Some colleges or high schools may not admit students with these types of records.
• Alternative learning centers are often more focused on behavioral issues than impeccable education. Your student may experience a lower educational standard while at their learning center.
• Your student could get treated differently. Your school has recommended an overblown punishment for what was likely a simple classroom infraction. This may result in your student being treated like a criminal when that certainly isn't the case. This will have additional repercussions on your student's mental health.

Can My School Recommend Alternative Education More Than Once?

Yes. In New York, your school can recommend alternative education placement more than once if it can find rationale. This means that if your student continues to violate your school's behavioral code or if your student doesn't meet your school's academic requirements on a routine basis, multiple placements could be in your child's future.

This is one of the reasons your student needs to avoid the first disciplinary placement your school recommends in the first place! Not only will your school be more comfortable sending your student back to alternative education, but some of the criteria for a secondary disciplinary placement (e.g., being behind academically) are far easier to achieve or demonstrate when your student has already been out of school for a significant amount of time.

Attorney Lento and the Education Defense Team can help your student avoid this outcome.

What are My Next Steps if I Learn that My NY School Is Expelling My Child?

Working quickly is key. When disciplinary placements occur, parents don't always have time on their side — and, in some cases, you might even have to take action after the placement has happened, especially if your school took emergency action to place your child.

As soon as you're able, consider taking these steps:

1. Call your child's current or previous school immediately. You need to get a full account of exactly what's happened. Your child may be too distraught to communicate clearly at this time. Get someone from your school to tell you why your student faces such strict discipline.
2. Call Attorney Joseph D. Lento and the Education Defense Team at the Lento Law Firm. The sooner the Lento Law Firm Team has all of the information surrounding your case, the sooner they can help you devise a strategy to support your student.
3. Make sure your student is okay. Once they feel comfortable discussing what's happened, ask them to talk to you about what might have led up to the (alleged) punishable event, or if anything has happened recently to make them feel uncomfortable at school. Keep a record of everything you discuss.
4. Start an evidence file. Keep every teacher note, piece of homework feedback, and piece of correspondence that your school officials send you related to your student's disciplinary experience.
5. Track down your school's code of conduct, and find the specific rule or regulation that your student has (again, allegedly) violated. Or, if it would be helpful, ask Attorney Joseph D Lento and the Lento Law Firm Team for help completing this step.

Will NY Disciplinary Placements or Alternative Education Have Long-Term Effects on My Child?

If your student's disciplinary placement only really affected a short period of their life, it'd be tempting to adopt a mindset of just getting through the sanction and helping your student get back to their previous school as quickly as possible.

Alternative education placements do have lasting effects on children. Being separated from their peers, undergoing a rapid and significant life change, experiencing a very different form of education, and other aspects of disciplinary placements impact students' mental, physical, and emotional health.

It's also far more difficult to return to previous schools than you might think. And the recurrence rate of disciplinary placement recommendations is alarmingly high. If your student gets treated like a criminal once, your school will be more comfortable doing so again.

You need to stop this system in its tracks right now. Don't let your school send your student to an alternate high school. Retain the services of The Education Defense Team at the Lento Law Firm to negotiate a reduced sanction with your school immediately.

Will My NY High School Student Still Be Able to Attend College?

Yes, your student will still be able to attend college — if they can get into one. There isn't any law, rule, or regulation standing in an expelled student's path to college attendance.

This doesn't mean that their expulsion or disciplinary placement won't affect their chances. Your student's permanent record will contain information about your student's dismissal or other disciplinary experiences. Any college your student applies to will want to know more about their expulsion and the events leading up to it — which often results in application rejection.

How Can an Attorney Help with a New York High School Disciplinary Placement?

Once your student receives a notification that they will receive a disciplinary placement, you need to act fast. You also need to have detailed knowledge about the New York disciplinary placement system — and your own school's code of conduct and due process.

That's a lot to keep in mind, especially while your family's going through a stressful time. Attorney Joseph D. Lento and the Education Defense Team at the Lento Law Firm have years of experience defending high school students after their school attempts disciplinary placement.

It's key to remember that your student does not stand charged with a crime. They have not broken any laws. Their punishment is not permanent, and you can take action to pursue a different outcome. However, what they are facing is serious — which means you need to retain the services of the Lento Law Firm Team immediately after learning about their situation.

Joseph D. Lento and the Lento Law Firm Team can negotiate directly with your school on your student's behalf, attend expulsion hearings, help you keep track of evidence, and hold your school accountable to its own policies. As a result, your student has the best possible chance of experiencing your desired outcome.

Worried About a Potential NY Disciplinary Placement? The Lento Law Firm Team Can Help

If your NY high school student needs further help and support, you need to feel like you have options to provide what they need. You don't need your state to step in and make decisions about your child's education and restrict your options.

Disciplinary placement can feel like just that. And, unfortunately, when schools start talking about disciplinary placement, NY students and parents alike can wonder if they have any say about what's going to happen to their futures.

Joseph D. Lento and the Education Law Team at the Lento Law Firm strongly believe that you should be able to protect your student's future. If your student's education has been called into question, you need the support and guidance only the Lento Law Firm can provide. You can't let a misunderstanding change your child's life. Whether you need to file an appeal, negotiate with your school, or otherwise advocate for your child's future, the Lento Law Firm can help. Contact Attorney Joseph D. Lento and the Lento Law Firm today by calling 888.535.3686.