Texas Disciplinary Placement – Odessa

Odessa, Texas, area schools impose student discipline, including sending students to disciplinary alternative education placement, otherwise known as DAEP, just like other school districts throughout the state. DAEP placement, effectively in a reform school or boot camp setting, can be extremely discouraging to your student, could delay your student's development, and could harm your student's future. Call 888.535.3686 or use this contact form now to retain the Lento Law Firm's premier Student Defense Team out of our Dallas, Austin, El Paso, and Houston offices for our defense of DAEP charges in Odessa and throughout Ector County. Don't leave your student's DAEP defense in the hands of unqualified local counsel.

Odessa Area Schools District Student Defense

Our skilled and experienced student discipline defense attorneys are available for your student's defense throughout the Odessa area and the Ector County Independent School District at all twenty-nine of the area's elementary schools and these middle schools and high schools:

Ector County ISD High Schools

• George H.W. Bush New Tech Odessa;
• Odessa Collegiate Academy Early College High School;
• Odessa Career and Technical Early College High School;
• Odessa High School;
• Permian High School.

Ector County ISD Middle Schools

• Austin Montessori Magnet School;
• Bonham Middle School;
• Bowie Middle School;
• Cameron Dual Language Magnet School.
• Crockett Middle School;
• Ector College Prep Success Academy;
• Ector County Youth Center;
• Nimitz Middle School;
• The Stem Academy;
• Wilson & Young Medal of Honor Middle School.

Odessa Area Schools DAEP Program

Texas Education Code Section 37.008 requires the Ector County Independent School District, together with other school districts near Odessa, to maintain a disciplinary alternative education program for unruly, disruptive, and dangerous students who commit serious wrongs. The Ector County ISD calls its DAEP program the Alternative Education Center, located on East Yukon Road between Andrews Highway and North Grandview Avenue, far from the Ector County ISD's traditional high school and middle school programs. The Ector County ISD Student Code of Conduct authorizes the transfer of students to its DAEP program at the Alternative Education Center. While your student's school officials may speak glowingly about the services and instruction your student would receive at the Alternative Education Center to induce you to consent to your student's DAEP transfer, beware of doing so. DAEP schools house student populations of the most troubled students, already disciplined for drug, alcohol, weapons, violence, gangs, and other serious charges. DAEP schools generally have significantly lower graduation, advancement, and retention rates. They may also have strict dress codes and attendance requirements and less structure and peer support than the regular school. Let us help you preserve your student's regular classroom enrollment.

Odessa Area Schools Student Code of Conduct

Your student's Odessa area school officials will enforce the Ector County ISD's district-wide Student Code of Conduct regarding disciplinary violations warranting DAEP placement. Texas Education Code Section 37.001 requires school districts to adopt a student conduct code providing for DAEP placement. School districts must offer DAEP programs. Indeed, Texas Education Code Sections 37.006 and 37.007 require school districts to send students to their DAEP programs under certain circumstances. Ector County ISD's Student Code of Conduct incorporates those statutory DAEP provisions. Don't ignore or minimize your student's DAEP charges. Let us help defend and defeat those charges.

Odessa Area Schools Removal Grounds

The first thing that often happens leading to a DAEP placement or threat of DAEP placement is that school officials remove the student from the school for a short-term suspension, long-term suspension, or expulsion. The Ector County ISD Student Code of Conduct permits officials at your student's Odessa area school to remove your student if they believe that your student committed any General Conduct Violation. Removal from the school could lead to DAEP placement. But it doesn't have to do so. Our attorneys have the substantial skill and experience to raise all your student's available factual and legal defenses and to make a case to mitigate any sanction to keep your student in the regular classroom. Beware the school's rush to judgment. Don't let them use school removal and DAEP placement to avoid having to provide your student with required instruction and special education services. The Ector County ISD's Student Code of Conduct authorizes your student's school removal on all of these grounds:

• playful behavior like horseplay and roughhousing when it threatens student or teacher safety;
• violent behavior, including fighting, shoving, and scuffling, whether injurious or not;
• duress, threat, force, extortion, coercion, or blackmail, forcing a person to do or not do something against their will;
• any form of derogatory statements disrupting the school or inciting violence, such as bullying, cyberbullying, name-calling, and hazing;
• harassing another student, employee, or volunteer, whether sexually or otherwise;
• distributing intimate visual material without consent, making invasive visual recordings, and vulgarity, profanity, or obscenity;
• kissing, hugging, or other inappropriate physical or sexual contact with another student or an employee or volunteer, with or without consent;
• threatening bodily injury of another student or an employee or volunteer;
• bringing tobacco, fireworks, drugs, drug paraphernalia, firearms, other weapons, pornography, other sexually oriented material, or other prohibited items onto school grounds;
• theft, trespass, vandalism, or other defacing, damaging, or misusing of school property or of another person's property;
• bomb threats, interfering with fire alarms, extinguishers, or smoke detectors, setting fires, and other safety disruptions;
• computer hacking, unauthorized file access, and other violations of school technology rules;
• violating grooming criteria or dress codes;
• disobeying principal, teacher, or other staff member commands, teacher insubordination, or failing to provide student identification on request; and
• academic dishonesty, misrepresentation, cheating, plagiarism, and falsifying or destroying school records.

Odessa Area Schools Discretionary DAEP

Texas Education Code Section 37.001 and other education law provisions grant Odessa area school officials the authority to exercise their discretion for permissive DAEP placement. In other words, your student's school disciplinary officials may not have to send your student to DAEP placement but may nonetheless choose to do so. As indicated briefly above, school officials sometimes use DAEP placement as a way to get rid of an obligation or issue they don't want to directly address, such as a student needing special education services or other accommodation or a student whose poor academic performance may affect the school's state scorecard, standing enrollment, and reputation. The Ector County ISD Student Code of Conduct authorizes your student's Odessa area school officials to send your student to DAEP placement for any of the above General Conduct Violations. Don't let that happen. Get our help.

Odessa Area Schools Mandatory DAEP

You've just seen that Odessa area school officials have discretionary authority under both Texas Education Code Section 37.001 and the Ector County ISD Student Code of Conduct to send your student to DAEP placement. However, in some cases, Texas Education Code Sections 37.006 and 37.007 require DAEP placement of your student when shown to have committed certain serious wrongs. The Ector County ISD's Student Code of Conduct accordingly incorporates those mandatory DAEP provisions. Just because the statutes and Student Code of Conduct label it mandatory doesn't mean that charges will result in DAEP placement. Our attorneys have the substantial skill and experience to defend and defeat even mandatory DAEP charges. The statutes and Ector County ISD Student Code of Conduct require DAEP placement for the following wrongs:

• false fire alarms and false bomb threats;
• injuring another purposefully, knowingly, or recklessly;
• drug, alcohol, or firearm possession in school;
• drug or alcohol use or impairment in school;
• indecent or lewd conduct in school;
• harassing or assaulting school volunteers or employees;
• committing felony crimes in school;
• sexual assault of a student or
• continuous sexual abuse of a child or disabled person.

Odessa Area Schools DAEP Defenses

We've already suggested above that just because your student faces an Odessa area school disciplinary charge does not mean that your student has committed a wrong, that school officials will necessarily impose a suspension, or that your student will end up in a DAEP placement at the Ector County ISD's Alternative Education Center. We may be able to raise any one of several affirmative defenses to the charge through skilled and strategic advocacy. We may be able to show that complaining witnesses are lying, retaliating, confused, or without first-hand knowledge of the matters they allege. We may be able to show that no misconduct occurred or that someone other than your student committed the alleged misconduct. Even if your student did commit the alleged wrong, we may be able to make a substantial case to mitigate or even eliminate any sanction and keep your student in the regular classroom. Texas Education Code Section 37.001 lists these statutory mitigating factors, which the Ector County ISD Student Code of Conduct incorporates:

• your student committed the misconduct in justified self-defense;
• your student did not have the bad intent to commit the misconduct;
• your student has no prior history of any wrongdoing;
• your student's disability prevented recognizing the wrong; or
• your student was homeless or in foster care.

Odessa Area Schools DAEP Emergency Placement

The first thing you may hear about your student's potential DAEP placement is that school officials have already removed your student from the school on an emergency basis. Texas Education Code Section 37.019 authorizes school officials to remove and bar students from school without notice whenever a student seriously interferes with teaching, school events, or school operations. The Ector County ISD Student Code of Conduct carries out Section 37.019 by authorizing emergency removal on the same terms. Fortunately, emergency removals must only be short-term. If school officials intend to bar your student for more than ten days, including sending your student to DAEP placement, then they must provide your student with a hearing.

Odessa Area Schools DAEP Placement Hearing

Texas Education Code Sections 37.009 and 37.019 guarantee your student a formal hearing whenever your student faces removal for DAEP placement. The Ector County ISD's Student Conduct Code carries out those statutory assurances, likewise promising your student a formal hearing on DAEP charges. A hearing means our opportunity to present your student's defense evidence while challenging the school's evidence of wrongdoing. Even if your student committed the alleged wrong, we can argue for mitigation and elimination of any sanction to keep your student in the regular classroom with a clean school record.

Odessa Area Schools DAEP Appeal

Do not despair if your student has already lost the DAEP hearing. We can take your student's statutory appeals available under Texas Education Code Section 37.009, as the Ector County ISD Student Conduct Code recognizes, with the goal of reversing the DAEP placement for your student's reinstatement in the regular classroom. Section 37.009 sends appeals either to the full ISD board or, if the board affirms the DAEP placement, then to the Ector County district court. Our attorneys have the substantial skills and experience necessary for compelling administrative and court appeals.

Alternative Special Relief

If you and your student have exhausted all formal avenues for relief, including hearings and appeals, our attorneys have the reputation and relationships to communicate and negotiate with the Ector County ISD general counsel office, outside retained counsel, or other oversight official for special alternative relief. Your student has federal and state disability, non-discrimination, and other rights and interests that we may be able to sensitively and diplomatically raise to convince oversight officials of the wisdom of restoring your student to the regular classroom with appropriate assurances. Let us pursue all avenues until we obtain your student's best outcome.

Premier Odessa Area DAEP Defense Attorneys

If your student faces DAEP charges in the Odessa, Texas area, retain the Lento Law Firm's highly qualified Student Defense Team. Attorneys from our Dallas, Austin, El Paso, and Houston offices represent clients throughout Ector County. Do not risk your student's future on representation by unqualified local counsel. Call 888.535.3686 or use our contact form now for our premier defense representation. Learn more details here about Texas DAEP matters.