- The North Carolina School Boards Association warned the state Supreme Court Monday about the potential negative impact of one of the cases on its docket.
- In KH v. Dixon, a family seeks damages from the Alamance-Burlington school board for alleged constitutional violations. The alleged violations are linked to a teacher's reported assault of a middle-school student.
- Lower courts have ruled against the family. But a dissent at the state Court of Appeals noted the Supreme Court's 2021 decision in a precedent case called Deminski. It said schools could be held liable for "deliberate indifference" to harassment of students.
The North Carolina School Boards Association warns that a case before the state’s highest court could “undermine” educational access across the state if the plaintiffs win. The case involves a family’s constitutional claims against the Alamance-Burlington Board of Education.
In KH v. Dixon, the family of a middle school student claims the Alamance-Burlington schools violated the student’s constitutional right to access a sound basic education. The source of the alleged violation was teacher Danielle Dixon’s alleged assault against the student in a classroom.
A split state Appeals Court panel ruled against the family in its constitutional complaint against the school district. Yet a dissenting judge would have allowed the family to proceed with its claims.
The dissent cited the state Supreme Court’s 2021 decision in Deminski v. State Board of Education. In that case, the high court explained that “deliberate indifference” to ongoing harassment of students violated their constitutional right to a sound basic education.
The KH plaintiffs hope the North Carolina Supreme Court will agree with the dissenting Appeals Court judge. But the state School Boards Association filed an amicus, or friend-of-the-court, brief Monday siding with the Alamance-Burlington schools.
“[T]he right to an opportunity for a sound, basic education ‘is not a right to a perfect or flawless education,’ free from bad actors or bad things,” the association’s lawyers wrote. “Yet that impossible qualitative standard is what plaintiff asks the Court to impose on the state here.”
“No student should have to endure what the plaintiff in this case described, and teachers who engage in tortious conduct like that alleged in the complaint should be held accountable by the law,” the school boards’ court filing continued. “But holding a school board (and, by extension, the public) constitutionally liable on the facts alleged in this case would defy North Carolina law and the holdings of other jurisdictions across the country. It would also actively undermine meaningful access to a sound basic education for all students.”
“If a single, isolated instance of tortious conduct at school is transformed into a constitutional deprivation, school boards will be severely hindered in their ability to ‘guard and maintain’ the right for all students,” the association’s lawyers added. “A ruling in plaintiff’s favor will decrease the likelihood of school officials being notified of bad actors in the schools and increase the likelihood that other students will suffer similar harms from those bad actors.”
“Such a ruling also will eviscerate governmental immunity, will irreparably harm the children of this state, and ultimately will reduce educational opportunities by diverting resources from the classroom to the courtroom,” the school boards group argued.
Chief Justice Paul Newby wrote the unanimous 16-page opinion in the Deminski case. It allowed a family with three students to proceed with a lawsuit against the Pitt County school board and State Board of Education. Two of the children were autistic. The suit contended that school officials’ indifference to ongoing harassment of the students violated their constitutional rights.
The Supreme Court’s ruling reversed the state Appeals Court’s 2-1 decision. As with the KH case, the split Appeals Court would have blocked the Deminski lawsuit from moving forward.
“Where a government entity with control over the school is deliberately indifferent to ongoing harassment that prevents a student from accessing his constitutionally guaranteed right to a sound basic education, the student has a colorable claim under the North Carolina Constitution,” Newby wrote.
A colorable claim “must present facts sufficient to support an alleged violation of a right protected by the State Constitution,” the chief justice explained.
In addition to being physically grabbed and pushed, interrupted during tests, and otherwise bothered by fellow students, the plaintiff students in Deminski faced additional harassment based on lewd sexual conduct and commentary.
The students and their mother, Ashley Deminski, repeatedly informed the teacher, principal, and assistant principal about the harassment, according to the court opinion. The Pitt County school board also was aware of the incidents.
Nothing happened to fix the problem. “[W]hile school personnel insisted that there was a ‘process’ that would ‘take time,’ the bullying and harassment continued with no real change,” Newby wrote.
The defendants’ lawyers argued that sovereign or governmental immunity blocked the students’ constitutional claims. The Supreme Court rejected that argument.
“[P]laintiff contends that the complaint presented sufficient allegations of a colorable constitutional claim to survive defendant’s motion to dismiss. We agree,” Newby wrote. “The right to the ‘privilege of education’ and the State’s duty to ‘guard and maintain’ that right extend to circumstances where a school board’s deliberate indifference to ongoing harassment prevents children from receiving an education.”
Newby noted state constitutional provisions that supported the Deminski lawsuit. “Article I, Section 15 places an affirmative duty on the government ‘to guard and maintain that right’ [to education],” he wrote. “Taken together, Article I, Section 15 and Article IX, Section 2 require the government to provide an opportunity to learn that is free from continual intimidation and harassment which prevent a student from learning. In other words, the government must provide a safe environment where learning can take place.”
“Notably, the right to a sound basic education rings hollow if the structural right exists but in a setting that is so intimidating and threatening to students that they lack a meaningful opportunity to learn,” the chief justice added.