High school should be a great time of growth and development for a student. For some students, high school instead becomes a series of ever more serious challenges. In the worst case, your high school student could face suspension, expulsion, or even alternative placement in a reform school or boot camp. These issues can involve allegations of academic issues of failing or missing classes, behavioral misconduct over drugs or alcohol, or even Title IX sexual misconduct. Treat any such issue seriously, getting the attorney advisor help that your student needs. But in other cases, the problems have to do with the school's inability or refusal to provide the resources, instruction, and disability accommodations the student needs to progress. If your high school student faces one or more of these serious issues challenging your student's ability to graduate on time from the traditional high school, retain national education attorney advisor Joseph D. Lento and the Lento Law Firm's student defense team to hold school officials accountable to help your student persevere. Protect your student's goals, ambitions, and future.
The Issues High School Students Face
High school can be great, but students don't always have it easy. High school students can face any number of very serious issues, any one of which could derail their high school education. Federal and state education laws and local district policies give your student certain rights to high school services, support, resources, and accommodations. If your student faces any of these challenges, retain national student defense attorney advisor Joseph D. Lento to hold high school officials accountable to their obligations to educate your student.
Failure to Progress
High school students have varying academic interests and skills. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to graduate from high school. But many states and schools require high school graduates to meet specific academic benchmarks. And virtually all high schools have attendance requirements of some kind. Failing courses, getting held back a grade, dropping out because of discouragement, or getting kicked out because of attendance issues can all be serious concerns.
Failure to Accommodate Disability
High schools are subject to the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act requiring that the schools reasonably accommodate student disabilities. High schools must identify students with disabilities, prepare an individualized education plan (IEP), and implement that plan. High schools don't always do so. And when high schools fail in their obligations to identify and accommodate student disabilities, the students can face discipline for misconduct instead, for example, when the school's failure to accommodate triggers the student's psychiatric event. Federal law requires that the school conduct a manifestation determination before changing your disabled student's placement because of alleged misconduct. Don't let your student's high school violate your student's disability rights.
Academic Misconduct
High schools don't generally promptly kick students out for cheating, plagiarism, or similar forms of academic misconduct, except in the more severe and scandalous instances. High school disciplinary officials tend instead to see high school as a time when students learn academic norms regarding acceptable academic conduct. But some students do suffer serious discipline for high school cheating or other academic misconduct, right up to expulsion. And those students may lose important educational opportunities and awards within the high school. Beware of academic misconduct allegations.
Behavioral Misconduct
Behavioral misconduct can become a serious high school issue. While school officials may treat academic misconduct as a learning opportunity, under state law they may instead have to severely punish certain forms of behavioral misconduct, especially weapons and drug violations. But other forms of behavioral misconduct that school officials will take seriously and can punish harshly include alcohol possession or abuse, smoking or vaping, fighting, gang activities, vandalism, computer misuse, theft, insubordination toward teachers and administrators, and disrupting classes. Beware allegations that your high school student engaged in serious behavioral misconduct.
Title IX Sexual Misconduct
Title IX is the federal law prohibiting sex discrimination in schools that receive federal funding. Title IX requires high schools to protect students from sexual assault, stalking, sexual harassment, and similar forms of sexual misconduct, not just from school employees but also from students. If another student accuses your student of sexual violence or touching, or even sexual comments and innuendo, those accusations could result in your student's immediate removal from the school and eventual expulsion. Title IX allegations are among the most serious of high school charges.
The Sanctions High Schools Impose
When high school students get off track, high school officials don't always take the approach of getting them back on track. Sometimes, school officials seem to not want to deal with the student. And under state education laws, school officials can often find ways to remove the student from the school whenever they can make a case that the student is at risk of not progressing or is disrupting the educational environment. School officials may take any of the following approaches, any of which could delay, disrupt, or even entirely derail your student's high school graduation and future. School officials could also require remedial actions like apologies, restitution, extra coursework, or school service. But the following sanctions, rather than being remedial, could leave your student without educational services. These sanctions could also leave your student with a high school record of misconduct that could interfere with your student's college admission, vocational licensure or certification, job opportunities, and other important aspects of your student's future.
Loss of High School Honors and Awards
High school officials offer students honor rolls, service awards, and other distinctions to promote good student behavior in high school, help the graduate gain admission to preferred colleges and universities, and gain other post-graduate opportunities like internships and jobs. Any significant high school issue, including any of the types listed above, can cause those school officials to disqualify your student for those honors and awards. It may seem like a small thing, but it can go a long way in your student's mind and motivation.
Loss of High School Athletics and Other Privileges
High school officials can take a carrot-and-stick approach toward motivating and disciplining students. The stick is discipline. Athletics, choir, band, clubs, academic honors, service awards, and similar activities and privileges are the carrots. Those activities may indeed seem more like privileges than essentials. But high school isn't just about academics. It is also about physical and social development. Athletics can be critical to physical development and critical for structure and motivation. Avoid letting school officials kick your student out of athletics and other activities if you can.
High School Course Reassignments
High schools often have different tracks, some for succeeding students and others for at-risk or failing students. When a high school student starts to struggle, whether with academics or behaviorally, school officials may see the solution to be removing the student from the on-track classroom in favor of a class for at-risk or failing students. In theory, a change of classroom could be good, meaning more services and fewer distractions. But in practice, removing a student from the rigorous classroom to a classroom of at-risk students can be more like warehousing problems. If you can, keep your student in the regular classroom.
High School Suspension
Suspension is an easy solution for high school administrators who wish not to deal with a student's special challenges. Suspension removes the student to home, shifting much of the responsibility for education from the teachers and administrators to the parents or guardians at home. And despite the school's willingness to send assignments home, few parents or guardians are able to meet those temporary home-schooling challenges. Whether your student's suspension is for less than ten days or instead becomes a long-term or permanent suspension beyond ten days, avoid the interruption if you can.
High School Expulsion
In the worst case, high school officials may simply expel a struggling or disruptive student. State statutes tend to limit mandatory expulsion to certain grounds like weapons or drugs. But state statutes often have more general grounds on which a school principal can seek expulsion, like repeated disruptive behavior. And sometimes, a principal's desire to expel a student for vaguely defined misconduct can seem more like trying to get rid of a problem than solving the challenge of properly educating the student. Avoid your student's expulsion if you can.
Alternative High School Placement
Many school districts offer alternative high schools. Those schools can sound like a good place for a struggling student. Beware the alternative high school. Alternative high schools may have great theories about flexible and individualized instruction. But they can become warehouses for failing, dangerous, disruptive, and unmotivated students. Alternative high schools can also be so flexible as not to have the structure your student would need to stay on track toward graduating with a rigorous high school education. Alternative disciplinary placement in a non-traditional high school also removes your student from the peer and mentor support and school activities that may be motivating your student. Avoid your student's alternative high school placement if you can.
Your High School Student's Stakes
Don't underestimate the stakes that your high school student has in disputes of these kinds, threatening your student's ability to graduate from your student's traditional high school, on time with your student's classmates, and with the full benefit of the school's instruction, activities, and resources. High school students are progressing through a critical stage of their mental, emotional, physical, and social development. Interruptions in high school education, and disruptions like being set back a year, missing out on athletics and other activities, or having to attend an alternative high school, can cripple a student's development. A traditional high school program offers sound instruction, teacher, advisor, and mentor relationships, peer relationships that motivate, sustain, and support your student, and music, arts, athletics, and other social activities. The combination and integration of those dimensions makes high school so important as a launching pad into adulthood. In short, when facing significant high school issues, your student has a future at stake, including education, vocational training, licenses and certifications, and family and social relationships. Protect your high school student's future. Treat your student's high school issue most seriously.
The Value of an Education Lawyer / Attorney Advisor
Some parents whose high school student faces discipline, dismissal, alternative placement, or other challenges completing the high school program with the student's class, on time in the traditional program, go it alone. They argue on their own with school officials, without knowing their student's rights. Other parents hire an unqualified local criminal defense attorney who doesn't know school law, procedures, and customs. Neither proceeding unrepresented or hiring unqualified counsel serves your student's interests. Your student needs a premier education lawyer or attorney advisor who knows education law and academic administrative procedures. Only a skilled and experienced education lawyer or attorney advisor can assert the proper legal theories in the proper administrative forums, with just the right tone and tenor to get your student the best available relief. An experienced education lawyer or attorney advisor can quickly gain the attention and respect of your student's high school officials, to work with you and your student on a favorable negotiated outcome.
Premier Attorney Advisor Representation Available
National school discipline defense attorney advisor Joseph D. Lento has successfully represented hundreds of students nationwide on all kinds of discipline, misconduct, and other issues. If your high school student faces suspension, dismissal, alternative placement, or other barriers to completing high school with peers, on time and at your student's traditional high school, retaining skilled and experienced attorney advisor representation is your best move. Give your high school student the best chance to succeed. Call 888.535.3686 or go online now to retain attorney advisor Lento and the Lento Law Firm's student defense team, even if you and your high school student have already exhausted all apparent avenues for relief. Attorney advisor Lento has helped many students gain alternative special relief through oversight channels. Trust attorney advisor Lento for your student's best possible results.
