Book Description

This handbook for elementary and secondary school principals contains several chapters on topics important to building level administrators. Each chapter summarizes relevant state and federal court decisions and statutes, concluding with recommendations for practice. The handbook is divided into four sections: students and the law, special education and the law, teachers and the law, and school and the law. The first section contains seven chapters on topics covering the First (expression), Fourth (search and seizure), and Fourteenth (procedural and substantive due process) Amendments; student discipline; child abuse; student-to-student sexual harassment; and student records. The second section contains seven chapters on topics that cover the federal laws protecting students with disabilities and recent relevant cases in which the courts have interpreted those statutes as they apply to student discipline and transition, parents' rights, infectious diseases, and physical access. The third section contains seven chapters covering topics related to teachers' rights and responsibilities: student injury, sexual harassment, academic freedom, performance evaluations, documentation and dismissal, and certification (licensure). The final section contains 10 chapters covering a variety of legal issues which principals commonly face: religious activities and instruction, copyright, affirmative action, school desegregation, and finance. The section also covers charter schools and alternative dispute resolution, and ends with a chapter on new directions in school law. The fifty-one authors of the chapters are either practicing attorney, professors of education, or university administrators who teach and write in the area of school law. (PKP)