Walk It Through: The School Year
Bullying online, a hazing at a club, a suspension, and a teacher who sees bruises.
A student is targeted by classmates in group texts and threatened at school.
Two things a person in this spot might do. Picking one shows what the law says about it.
One school year. Students with disabilities, expulsion hearings in full, criminal charges for the fight and the school's own anti-bullying policy are not worked through here.
A practice walkthrough, not a prediction of how any real one will go. Legal information, not legal advice.
Words this turns on
Terms with a legal meaning that is narrower than the everyday one. Each links to the definition and the authority behind it.
- HazingSubjecting a member or pledge of a student group to bodily danger, forced drinking or eating, assaults, confinement or sleep deprivation as a condition of membership. A student who personally does it commits a misdemeanor.
- MisdemeanorAny crime that is not a felony. Unless a section sets another punishment, it carries up to six months in county jail, a fine of up to $1,000, or both.
- Harassment, intimidation or bullyingAn intentional act or threat by a student that a reasonable person should know will harm another student or put them in reasonable fear, or that is severe enough to create an intimidating school environment, including by phone or online.
- MinorA person under eighteen years of age. A minor who has been married may enter contracts and sue on them.
- NeglectedA child without the parental care, subsistence, medical care or control needed for their well-being because of what the parents did or failed to do.
- Required reporterAny person, teachers, nurses and doctors included, with reason to believe a child has been abused, abandoned or neglected, who reports within twenty-four hours.
- Deadly weaponUnder the concealed weapons chapter, any dirk, dirk knife, bowie knife or dagger, and any instrument designed or intended to be readily capable of causing death or serious bodily injury.
- Temporary suspensionA short removal from school by a principal or superintendent, after an informal hearing, of no more than five school days by the principal.