Impact Litigation

The Racial Justice Project has joined as co-counsel with the National Legal Department of the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation to challenge educational inequality and the school-to-prison pipeline. The Project actively assists the ACLU with education litigation in Florida and Rhode Island. More information is available below.

FLORIDA GRADUATION LITIGATION

In response to the Circuit Court for Palm Beach County’s decision last year to dismiss the class action Schroeder, et al. v. The Palm Beach County School Board on the basis of there being no private right of action against a school district under Article IX, section 1 of the Florida Constitution, the American Civil Liberties Union and the New York Law School Racial Justice Project have once more filed a lawsuit challenging Palm Beach County’s abysmal graduation rates. The new suit, Aho et al. v. State of Florida et al., charges the state of Florida and its officials with violating the Florida Constitution by failing to adequately provide a free “uniform, efficient, safe, secure and high quality” public education to its citizens.

With as many as one in three Palm Beach County students not graduating on time with a regular diploma, a figure well below state and national averages, the suit requests that Florida officials take steps to increase the county’s graduation rate without pushing students out of the system. Although the suit seeks to improve graduation rates for the entire county, the complaint notes a graduation rate gap between white students and black students of thirty percent, and between white students and Hispanic students of twenty percent as further evidence of the state’s unconstitutional conduct. The suit also seeks implementation of a graduation rate caluculation that more accurately reflects the number of students enrolled in and graduating from Palm Beach County schools to replace the state’s current inconsistent and inflated calculations.

The ramifications of this suit are especially important in light of the well-documented links between failing to graduate, unemployment, poverty, and crime.

 

DOCUMENTS (Aho et al. v. State of Florida et al.)

Legal Documents

 

DOCUMENTS (Schroeder, et al. v. The Palm Beach County School Board)

Press Releases

Legal Documents

 

RHODE ISLAND LITIGATION

Alongside the ACLU the Racial Justice Project is tackling numerous inequities within the Rhode Island Family Court system by filing suit in Boyer v. Jeremiah. The suit challenges the manner in which the Rhode Island Family Court administers and operates its truancy court program. Specifically, the suit alleges that truancy courts in the cities of Coventry, Cumberland, North Providence, Providence, Westerly, and Woonsocket engage in various practices depriving students of their due process protections in violation of both state and federal law. Although these courts were initially designed to provide at-risk students with access to the services and support needed to stay in school, these courts are now often punitive in nature. Magistrates within these courts often threaten vulnerable children and their parents with baseless fines and imprisonment, remove children from the custody of their parents without legal justification, and fail to keep adequate records of court hearings.

The action also charges that the family court system disproportionately impacts children who have difficulty attending school or doing their schoolwork because of special education or medical needs. The action seeks, inter alia, a permanent injunction requiring the defendants to comply with the applicable constitutional provisions and statutory law that require adequate service of process, sufficient notice, and due process.

 

DOCUMENTS

Background Articles

Articles on the Lawsuit

Legal Documents