Getting Sanctioned for Alleged Misconduct Beyond Your NY School Gates?
More and more often, students attending NY K-12 schools are receiving sanctions not just for misconduct performed on school property. Now, it's not uncommon for parents to learn about alleged student misbehavior warranting sanctions that occurred at a friend's house over the weekend — or, increasingly, online.
In these situations, it's hard to know what to take seriously. It's also difficult to connect the dots between what your school has authority over and what sanctions may be completely unrelated to potential off-campus unwanted misbehavior. If your child is on the receiving end of sudden sanctions seemingly due to off-campus misconduct, you need to understand what's going on, and you need to be ready to act fast. Even innocuous-seeming sanctions can have far-reaching impacts on your child's future.
The Lento Law Firm is ready to assist. Our Student Defense Team has specific experience helping students in New York avoid long-term consequences associated with K-12 discipline. Call 888.535.3686 today or fill out this online form to tell us about your case, and our team can work hard to help you and your family, too.
What Types of Off-Campus Misconduct Might Your School Be Looking For?
You may not be used to the idea that your school is paying attention to what your student does off-campus. In our experience, we've seen that there are three general tiers of outside-of-school actions that your school could start noticing (and, on some occasions, punishing).
- Actions entirely unrelated to school misconduct regulations. Your NY school's code of conduct likely doesn't have provisions addressing non-school property damage or, say, a car theft. This could lead you to believe that your school doesn't have the basis to recommend a punishment if your student is (allegedly) involved in property damage that happens miles off campus. Despite the lack of connection, students are facing in-school punishments for these unrelated actions. Your school may justify its decision by expressing concerns about your student's influence on their peers.
- Actions tangentially related to school misconduct regulations. Does your school have an inclusivity policy, or a policy against cyberbullying? The expectation that your student follows these policies may extend beyond your school's borders. If your student is caught making derogatory remarks about groups of people or posting racist or otherwise problematic material online, your school may decide to punish that behavior on the grounds that this type of behavior can affect the school's overall environment, safety, and morale.
- Actions directly involving the school or the school's members. If anything happens to specifically impact the safety of a member of your school's community, there's an excellent chance that your school will want to be involved, regardless of the location of the alleged incident. Examples of this tier of off-campus action may include threatening a school member or cyberbullying your classmates.
In any of these scenarios, your school could provide a recommendation for sanction without necessarily connecting the dots for you or prioritizing your child's right to a full investigation or the ability to tell your side of the story. And, remember, even if your school moves to fully exonerate your child, a significant amount of reputation damage (and psychological damage for your child) can occur if your school threatens your student with sanctions and that information gets out to your academic community.
Whether it seems that severe sanctions are on the table or not, you need to work quickly. The moment you realize your student could be facing sanctions for off-campus misconduct, it's time to call the Student Defense Team at the Lento Law Firm at once.
Adjudication Differences: How Will Your NY K-12 School Respond to Off-campus Misconduct?
You may have a general idea about the types of punishments on the table if your student is associated with a classic in-school rule violation — say, if they cheat on a test. It's certainly not something you want them to be associated with, and you need to be prepared to deal with any possible sanctions in that scenario, too, but you might have a better idea of what is to come.
When your school starts sanctioning unrelated events with outsized punishments, you may not know where to begin.
Let's go back to our tiered approach. Often, the severity of your school's sanctions will escalate with the severity of the alleged infraction (or the connection of the infraction to the school or its policies).
So, if your student has been involved in an action entirely unrelated to school, your school may decide to sanction your student with a relatively mild and nonspecific sanction — for example, mandatory counseling.
If your student has been involved in something tangentially related to school policies, such as being associated with disparaging or inflammatory online remarks, your school may recommend a suspension, as it could view the incident as having a direct connection to the school community.
Alleged violence against a community member could, likewise, result in a quick expulsion regardless of where it happens.
Here's the thing, though: You can't expect the situation or your school's response to make sense. While the legal world adheres to a structured process ensuring fairness, schools often navigate these issues based on perceptions. It's essential to recognize that school-imposed consequences can drastically affect a student's future, sometimes even more so than legal ramifications. Don't leave things to chance; arm yourself with a legal perspective to ensure the best outcome.
Why Is Your School's Response Such a Big Deal? Here's Why Not to Ignore This…
If you take a look at your school's code of conduct, which should be freely available on your school's website, you'll likely find a list or matrix of potential punishments. That list of punishments may be lengthy.
It's also probably longer than it needs to be. By far, the most likely punishments that your school will recommend after an off-campus action that seems to warrant a school response are suspensions and expulsions.
You may not think that a suspension is a big deal. It is. Let's fast forward a few years to when your student is applying to their dream colleges. As part of their application process, your child will need to send their future schools information about their disciplinary past. Even if this isn't explicitly part of the application experience, with one glance at your student's transcript, admissions officers will be able to tell that your student received a suspension at one point.
This will result in difficult conversations in the application process. This is particularly true for off-campus actions, which, if they weren't connected to in-school punishments, might not have otherwise ended up on the college's radar.
It's not an overreaction to say that your response to this potential disciplinary event now will have an impact on your student's academic experiences for years to come. It is vital for parents to get involved early on, to handle the investigation from day one, and to protect their student's rights and reputation to help reduce the likelihood of severe discipline and ensure their child's record remains clean.
What You, as a Parent, Can Do to Protect Your Child
As a parent in New York, navigating the disciplinary intricacies of the large school district overseeing your child's school, whether it's Rochester City School District or Syracuse City School District, is critical.
But it's not easy. Your school's code of conduct will be dense. Your school may or may not follow its own policies closely. And you'll be stressed and overwhelmed helping your student manage their mental health as you go through this disciplinary experience.
Here's what we'd recommend parents tackle to advocate strategically for their students:
- Start by retaining the premier services of the Lento Law Firm Team. Our Student Defense Team has years of experience defending students and their rights through complex school disciplinary procedures — whether the initiating incident happened on campus or off it. In an initial consultation, we'll take the time to listen to you, understand the unique components of your case, and begin working with you to establish a strategic plan to protect your student and their future from undue harm.
- Document everything. Whether you had a hunch that disciplinary processes were coming or you were surprised by a suspension seemingly out of the blue, start writing down everything that's happening. Save emails. Create a folder for any documents that arrive in the mail. Talk to your child to figure out what happened. Ask them if anything else is happening at school (or outside of it) that you need to know about.
- Find your school's behavioral policies and start to skim through them. These will be very involved, complicated documents, and our team will be there for you to help you delve through them in greater detail. However, if your school references its own policies in any early communications or if you can find your school's conduct policies and begin to familiarize yourself with them, do so. This may give you and your family context for what the next few weeks (or longer) could entail.
Fortunately, you don't have to tackle any of this alone. From the moment you call our team, the Lento Law Firm will be able to help relieve you of the burden of dealing with your case, so you can spend time with your loved ones.
Here's Exactly How the Lento Law Firm Can Help You Through This Difficult Time
After you retain the services of our team, we can help you in several different ways. We'll be able to provide:
- Experienced defense. We understand the nuanced world of school disciplinary actions. We know how to build arguments that are persuasive in this specific context. We've seen the complex codes of conduct, and we know how to work within this system.
- Deft negotiation skills. We can open direct lines of communication with your school (and your school's Office of General Counsel, if needed) to negotiate with your school to reduce sanctions and protect your child's future.
- Representation. Throughout your student's disciplinary process, you may need to issue statements or appear in tense meetings or hearings. We can prepare you for these occasions or even speak on your behalf to maximize the efficacy of each of these occasions.
- Escalation, if necessary. If your school's normal avenues for relief do not end in the result you want for your child, the Lento Law Firm Team will be able to provide recommendations and assistance for any further steps you need to take.
Need Help Navigating New York School Disciplinary Procedures?
If you feel like the line between off-campus misconduct and in-school punishments is getting too thin, we can help.
The same goes for if you feel like your New York school is imposing harsh sanctions or acting too hastily when meeting our disciplinary measures — especially if you already feel like your school is overstepping its bounds in the first place.
You and your student need to take action to protect your rights now, not later. It's risky to assume anything about your school's investigative approach (e.g., that it'll be exhaustive or fair). It's also risky to think of any penalties your student may accrue as “just a school issue.”
Exclusionary discipline like sanctions and expulsions are far from “just school issues.” Even if your student is in elementary school, a sanction can set them behind their peers and have far-reaching impacts that could result in collegiate consequences.
At the Lento Law Firm, our Student Defense Team has years of extensive experience helping students both in New York and nationwide sidestep the academic repercussions that are increasingly linked to off-campus events. We can help initiate discussions with your school, help you manage your school's investigation, and more.
Retain the premier services of the Lento Law Firm Team today by calling us at 888.535.3686 or fill out this brief form to share details about your case.
