Washington is a great state in which to send your student through high school. The state provides strong support for secondary school education and offers abundant higher education and vocational training opportunities for high school graduates with good academic and behavioral records. Don't let you and your student lose all of that investment to Washington state high school disciplinary charges or academic failure issues. If your Washington state high school student faces misconduct issues threatening your student's enrollment and graduation, retain the Lento Law Firm's premier Student Defense Team to represent and defend your student for your student's best possible outcome. We are available in Seattle, Spokane, Tacoma, Vancouver, Bellevue, Kent, Everett, Renton, Spokane Valley, Federal Way, Yakima, Kirkland, Bellingham, Auburn, and other Washington locations. Call 888.535.3686 or use our contact form now to retain our highly qualified attorneys for strategic and effective defense services.
Washington High School Parental Interests
You need to keep your goals and your student's interests foremost in mind when your Washington state high school student faces disciplinary charges or academic failure issues, threatening school suspension, expulsion, and alternative disciplinary placement. Your goal should be to keep high school discipline from marring your student's high school record, discouraging your student from striving and causing your student other harm affecting your student's academic and social development. You want to see your student grow and flourish through high school, perhaps to gain admission to a preferred college, university, vocational, or professional program, and surely to benefit from stable, supportive relationships and good character and reputation. You and your student have doubtless already invested a lot in pursuing those goals. Don't lose sight of those goals simply because of Washington state high school disciplinary charges or academic failure issues.
Washington High School Discipline Impacts
Consider the potentially broad and disabling impact of Washington state high school disciplinary charges. High school and district officials could remove your student from the high school, dismiss or expel your student, and require your student to attend an alternative disciplinary high school or study high school subjects at home. Your student could suffer academic, psychological, and other developmental harm, even if the school imposes only lesser sanctions, like reprimands, in-school suspensions, after-school detentions, and loss of athletic and club privileges. Studies on the subject show that high school discipline can cause students to lose important opportunities in significant ways that alter the student's life trajectory or course. The impacts can be worse when the discipline is without grounds, unduly harsh, or unlawfully discriminatory, as unfortunately sometimes happens. You don't know how your student may respond, but depression, anxiety, and isolation from supportive students, teachers, family members, and friends could result. Let us help your student avoid those adverse impacts.
Washington's Education Discipline System
The Washington state legislature enacted education laws and authorized the state's Board of Education to adopt administrative regulations to govern the safe and secure operation of elementary and secondary schools, including the state's high schools. Your student's high school principal and other school and district officials can invoke those laws to remove your student from school if they allege lawful grounds and follow lawful procedures to do so. For example, Washington Code Section 28A.600.015 authorizes the state's schools to suspend and expel students whose behavior violates school or district rules, policies, and standards. For another example, Washington Code Section RCW 28A.345.090 authorizes the schools to adopt the state's model policy for student conduct and discipline. Your student's high school officials may invoke those statutes, policies, procedures, and rules to remove your student and refer your student to an alternative school. Let us help you challenge your student's school removal and fight to retain your student in school without disabling discipline.
Washington Board of Education Authority
Washington's legislature created the state's Board of Education with the statutory duty under Washington Code Section 28A.230.090 to establish and enforce high school graduation requirements. The Washington Board of Education carried out that authority with high school graduation administrative regulations compiled at Washington Administrative Code Chapter 18–51. The Board of Education and its delegated district and school authorities have the statutory and regulatory power to determine whether your student continues in high school, satisfies high school academic and conduct standards, and graduates from high school. Other statutes and Board of Education regulations address school misconduct like hazing, bullying, harassment, intimidation, and weapons, explosives, drugs, alcohol, tobacco, or gang activity in school. If your student faces misconduct charges, let us help challenge the school's legal authority and evidence to proceed. Let us help you and your student avoid discipline as the best possible outcome.
Washington School District Authority
Washington's state Board of Education carries out its statutory duties to instruct, supervise, and discipline the state's high school students through local school districts. Washington Administrative Code Chapter 180-24 provides for the organization and power of those school districts. Washington Administrative Code Section 180-40-080 and following rules provide that students must respect and submit to the authority of the local school district with respect to suspension, expulsion, or other discipline. While state statutes may provide the background for your student's disciplinary charges, school district policies and procedures may more directly determine the course and outcome of your student's high school disciplinary matter. Rely on our attorneys to invoke those district policies and procedures to your student's best strategic effect. Avoid discipline if at all possible.
Washington Local High School Authority
While state and district rules and procedures provide the backdrop to your Washington State high school student's disciplinary charges, the high school's principal carries the direct authority to impose discipline against your student. Washington Code Section 28A.400.110 states simply, “Within each school the school principal shall determine that appropriate student discipline is established and enforced.” Local school districts and high schools guide the principal's authority by adopting student codes of conduct. Your Washington state high school student must generally conform to a student code of conduct like one or more of the following codes:
- the Seattle Public Schools Basic Rules Handbook;
- the Spokane Public Schools Student Behavior Rules of Conduct;
- the Bellevue School District Code of Conduct;
- the Tacoma Public Schools District Handbook; and
- the Everett Public Schools Student Handbook.
Washington High School Academic Misconduct
Academic misconduct is a first form of misbehavior that could affect your Washington state high school student. Academic misconduct, better known as cheating, may not sound like a serious offense at the high school level. However, Washington state high schools are preparing students for college, university, and vocational training, where the institutions must take cheating very seriously to ensure program integrity and public confidence and safety. High schools also have their own reputation and integrity to protect. Teachers and principals may construe rampant, frequent, or flagrant cheating as disrespectful, insubordinate, disobedient, and disruptive conduct worthy of suspension or even expulsion in the worst cases. High schools can thus also place a premium on student compliance with academic norms, rules, standards, and instruction. The Seattle Public Schools Basic Rules Handbook, for instance, prohibits Academic Dishonesty/Plagiarism. High school cheating charges may often take the form of one or more of the following misbehaviors:
- using unauthorized materials or another student's secret assistance on a quiz, test, or exam;
- getting the unauthorized help of a parent, sibling, peer, tutor, or other person on a take-home quiz, exam, or other assignment supposed to be done alone;
- soliciting or obtaining answers to problem sets, quizzes, tests, or exams from other students who have already completed the assessment, or offering or providing such answers to other students;
- copying a published work without attribution while misrepresenting the work as one's own, in the form of plagiarism; or
- falsifying experiment observations or data or altering data to arrive at unsupported conclusions for academic credit.
Punishing Washington High School Academic Misconduct
Washington state high school officials may not punish a first offense of cheating with more than a caution, warning, or oral reprimand, and perhaps with the penalty of losing points or credit or repeating the work. Teachers may even treat a first wrong as a misunderstanding, requiring remedial education and training in the customs of academic work and attribution. If your student faces a first cheating charge, we may be able to help show the school's principal or other disciplinary official that your student should not suffer discipline but instead may benefit from remediation, leaving no record of any wrong. But repeated cheating after correction, in clear and deliberate violation of teacher instructions, in ways that disrupt the educational environment, may result in severe discipline up to suspension and expulsion. The Seattle Public Schools Basic Rules Handbook, for instance, prohibits both academic dishonesty and disruptive conduct “flagrantly and substantially interfering with teaching or learning in the classroom, school activities, or extracurricular activities.”
Washington High School Academic Misconduct Impacts
While academic misconduct can look like a victimless wrong, academic discipline can have serious consequences, especially for students who hope to attend a preferred college, university, or vocational program. Admission to such programs can be competitive, as every high school senior knows. One negative mark on an academic record, or the loss of class rank and academic honors that can follow academic misconduct discipline, may mean the difference in failing to gain program admission. Your student could also find that the school would bar participation in athletics, clubs, and social activities due to the discipline, and could lose mentor, teacher, advisor, and other helpful relationships. Beware the serious impacts of academic misconduct findings and discipline.
Washington High School Academic Misconduct Defense
You and your student can and should defend academic misconduct allegations with the help of our highly qualified attorneys. Academic administrative defense differs from other lawyer advocacy, like the advocacy a criminal defense attorney deploys in court proceedings. We have the sensitive skills and insightful experience to advocate and negotiate for alternative remedial relief, especially with academic misconduct issues. If your student's school officials won't consider remedial relief and instead insist on pursuing formal disciplinary charges, then we can help you and your student invoke the district's protective procedures to present your student's exonerating or mitigating evidence and arguments. We can also take appeals, pursue court review, or seek alternative special relief if you and your student have already lost all hearings.
Washington High School Behavioral Misconduct
Washington high schools can be volatile environments as students mature and learn adult expectations, customs, and norms. High school principals and other disciplinary officials may be quick on the trigger to pursue formal disciplinary charges for behavioral misconduct when your student is still growing and maturing, and positive and constructive correction would better serve both the high school and your student. Yet the above Washington state education laws, rules, regulations, and student conduct codes clearly empower high school officials to hold your student accountable and to punish your student with discipline up to suspension or expulsion for violating school rules. The Tacoma Public Schools District Handbook, for instance, authorizes teachers to immediately remove students when “the student's presence poses an immediate and continuing danger to the student, other students, or school staff, or an immediate and continuing threat of substantial disruption of the class, subject, activity, or educational process of the student's school.” Your student's high school code of conduct will likely have provisions similar to these common provisions prohibiting:
- harassing, intimidating, offending, bullying, cyberbullying, or hazing other students;
- acts of violence like fighting, kicking, shoving, other assaults, and threats or coercive behavior;
- discrimination based on sex, race, religion, or disability, including disparaging, offensive, or demeaning comments, jokes, suggestions, or slurs;
- possessing guns, knives, explosives, or other weapons at school activities or on school grounds;
- interfering with fire alarms or fire suppression equipment, or blocking exits, entrances, and thoroughfares;
- possessing drugs, alcohol, tobacco, pornography, or other materials undermining student morals and welfare;
- stealing, damaging, or destroying school or personal property, including furniture, furnishings, equipment, vehicles, computers, backpacks, and other valuable items;
- trespass or other unauthorized access to facilities, files, or records, and other invasions of privacy;
- insubordination, disrespect, or disobedience toward teachers or other staff; and
- chronic or flagrant tardiness, absenteeism, truancy, or other conduct disruptive to school operations and the environment.
Washington High School Behavioral Misconduct Impacts
Washington state high school officials are likely to take disruptive, endangering, and damaging behavioral misconduct most seriously. School teachers and principals may not look the other way or otherwise excuse student misconduct that undermines school order and interferes with learning. Your student could suffer swift school removal followed by suspension and expulsion, ending up in an alternative disciplinary high school. You must already suspect that removal from the traditional classroom and regular high school can seriously affect your student's learning, removing the sound structure and supportive relationships of respectful peers and admiring teachers. Even if your student's discipline only involves reprimands, detentions, restitution, and school service, if the findings end up on your student's school record in the form of behavioral discipline, your student could lose admission to preferred higher education or vocational programs and suffer a broad range of other educational, social, reputational, and developmental harms.
Washington High School Behavioral Misconduct Defense
Our attorneys have the skill, commitment, passion, and experience to defend your Washington State High School student behavioral misconduct charges. The defense may simply involve arranging an early voluntary conciliation conference, at which we can present your student's exonerating and mitigating evidence while advocating for remedial relief that avoids harsh and damaging discipline. We can also invoke formal hearing procedures to present that evidence before an independent decision maker from outside the school, if school officials are already dead set to discipline your student. Cool-headed and impartial outside review may make the difference. We can also appeal to the district or state level and seek court review if you and your student have already lost all hearings and failed in conciliation efforts. Our attorneys also know how to approach district and state oversight officials for alternative special relief. Don't give in to behavioral misconduct charges when your student may have available relief. Get our highly qualified representation to save your student's high school education and clean school record.
Washington High School Sexual Misconduct
Sexual misconduct is another form of behavioral misconduct that can bring especially serious and daunting disciplinary charges. Washington state high school disciplinary officials generally treat sexual misconduct allegations under a different set of legal rules and procedures than other behavioral misconduct. Federal Title IX regulations, recognized in Washington Administrative Code Section 392-190-060, require the state's public high schools to prohibit and punish sexual assault, dating violence, stalking, and sexual harassment. Title IX regulations also impose special procedures protecting the putative victim, in some ways making student defense more challenging. Student conduct codes can extend those basic Title IX protections to also prohibit inappropriate language, inappropriate touching, and, in the case of the Seattle Public Schools Basic Rules Handbook, “unwanted attention, touching, or verbal comments such that the targeted person is uncomfortable, intimidated, or threatened by the behavior.” Beware the breadth and sensitivity of sexual misconduct allegations. Retain our attorneys at the first indication that your student may face Title IX sexual misconduct charges.
Washington High School Sexual Misconduct Impacts
Allegations of sexual misconduct can do more damage to a Washington state high school student's reputation and opportunities than nearly any other form of misconduct. High school officials can be especially sensitive to the liability risks and public reputational risks of ignoring or minimizing sexual misconduct complaints. They may jump to conclusions without due process, imposing damaging suspensions or expulsions in a rush to judgment. Your student may also suffer psychologically, socially, and emotionally from the damaging accusations and public and peer scrutiny. Once your student suffers any finding of sexual misconduct, future schools and programs may refuse your student admission. Your student could lose everything for which your student has studied and worked, and every hope for a good future, unless you treat the allegations with the seriousness they deserve.
Washington High School Sexual Misconduct Defense
Because of the seriousness of Title IX sexual misconduct charges, and the complexity of the Title IX rules and regulations, your student will need the skilled and experienced representation of our attorneys. While Title IX regulations tend to tip the playing field in the complainant's favor, those same regulations ensure that you may retain highly qualified defense counsel to cross-examine the accuser and take other actions to investigate and defend the charges. Let us help you gather your student's exonerating and mitigating evidence and present that evidence at the formal Title IX hearing while challenging each allegation and any incriminating evidence. Don't leave sexual misconduct allegations to chance. If your student has already suffered Title IX discipline, let us pursue appeals, court review, or oversight relief.
Washington High School Academic Progress Issues
High school is supposed to challenge students academically. Only through reasonable challenges can students learn at the rate and depth that they should. But high schools must balance those challenges so as not to unduly penalize and unjustly harm students who are still maturing while overcoming educational disabilities and other life challenges. The Washington Administrative Code Chapter 18–51's rigorous requirements for high school graduation can lead high school officials to ignore the special needs of a struggling student and instead force the student out of school and to an alternative disciplinary program, where the student's failure will not affect the school's resources and reputation. If your student faces school suspension or expulsion due to failing assignments, failing grades, chronic absences, and related academic progress issues, or faces repeating a grade, let our attorneys help you and your student show the school that it should instead accommodate and serve your student, to accomplish the school's proper educational mission.
Washington High School Academic Failure Causes
Academic failure can have a wide range of contributing causes, from student illness, injury, disability, or delayed development, to outside extraordinary stresses like the death or serious illness of a parent, separation or divorce of parents, and even domestic violence. High school teachers, advisors, and staff can also contribute to a student's struggles through poor instruction, failure to diagnose learning disabilities, and failure to provide required services, support, and accommodation. Unfortunately, Washington state high school principals may blame the struggling student for the school's failure. School bullying, hazing, harassment, and sexual assault can also keep a student from succeeding or progressing academically.
Addressing Washington High School Academic Progress Issues
Let us help you and your student diagnose and prove the complex causes, and get your student needed help and accommodation rather than suffer discipline. We may recommend invoking Washington state disability laws and regulations, under the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), for the school to evaluate your student for disability diagnosis and accommodation. We may be able to help you get the statutory second opinion if the school has already denied accommodations. We may also be able to negotiate remedial relief, whether your student has a disability or other factors interfering with learning. We can also invoke the school and district procedures to challenge holding back, suspension, or expulsion.
Washington High School Disciplinary Sanctions
You have seen in the above discussion that your student's Washington State high school officials may assert several different grounds to justify disciplining your student. We can help you and your student challenge those grounds. But you should also see from the above that your student's school has a range of options as to whether and how to punish or sanction your student. Some school districts, like the Spokane Public Schools in its Student Behavior Rules of Conduct, may offer restorative practices rather than punishment. Make no mistake: your student could face suspension, expulsion, and disciplinary boot camp or reform school placement. Your student could also lose school honors, athletics participation, club membership or leadership, and social activities, and suffer embarrassing detentions. But we may be able to show instead that the school better serves itself and your student by offering your student remedial training, remedial education, disability accommodations and services, school or community service, mentoring, or other non-disciplinary relief. Let us help you challenge inappropriately harsh and demotivating punishments in favor of restorative corrections.
Washington High School Disciplinary Sanction Issues
Parents of Washington State high school students facing disciplinary charges should be especially aware of certain common sanctions issues. First, high school disciplinary officials are human, at times exhibiting unfortunate biases and prejudices. Watch out for discriminatory punishment, based on your student's personal characteristics. School officials may also sometimes retaliate against students who report bullying, harassment, or even inadequate or poor instruction. Watch out for retaliatory discipline. School officials can also sometimes ignore a disabled student's right to accommodations and services, in ways that subject the student to discipline for academic failure or even disruptive conduct. Watch out for discipline arising out of school failures to accommodate disabilities. Disciplinary officials also sometimes just make arbitrary and capricious judgments, imposing unduly harsh and demeaning discipline on students who do not deserve such punishment and will suffer more harm than good from it. Let us help you and your student challenge inappropriate discipline.
Washington High School Discipline Limitations
Washington state high school officials do not have unlimited authority to impose whatever discipline they see fit in any case under any circumstances. Instead, certain laws and regulations limit the form of discipline officials may impose or the cases in which they impose discipline. For example, Washington Code Section 28A.150.300 prohibits corporal punishment throughout the state in all elementary and secondary schools. Your student's high school officials should not be paddling or otherwise using force to punish your student. For another example, the federal IDEA law prohibits discipline that removes a disabled student from the placement required under an individualized education program (IEP) without a manifestation review to ensure that the alleged misconduct was not the result of the school's failure to accommodate the disability. We can help you advocate these and other limits to discipline to ensure your student's proper treatment.
Washington High School Student Defense Rights
The above laws, rules, and regulations come with procedural protections that our attorneys can invoke to ensure that your student gets the best possible disciplinary charge outcome. Your student has constitutional rights of due process of law, meaning that your student's Washington State high school officials must notify you and your student of the allegations and give your student a fair hearing before an impartial decision maker. Washington Code Section 28A.600.015 expressly incorporates those due process protections into high school and other elementary and secondary school disciplinary proceedings. Your student should have a fair chance to present a defense while challenging the school's allegations and evidence, before a decision maker outside the school who is free of bias and conflicts of interest. We can help you enforce those defense rights to your student's best effect.
Washington High School Student Defense Services
Constitutional rights to due process are not self-executing. What that means is that you and your Washington State high school student must generally request, demand, and otherwise invoke those rights. You cannot simply stand idly by, expecting school officials to provide you and your student with every procedural protection that the Constitution and education laws require. You instead need the representation of a highly qualified academic, administrative attorney to know those protections and invoke them in the proper manner. Your student also needs our strategic insight, informed skills, and comprehensive experience to put those procedures to best effect. Let us help you conduct the conferences and hearings, take the appeals, obtain the court review, and seek other alternative special relief in your student's best interest. Your student's education and future are worth it.
Premier Washington High School Student Defense
The Lento Law Firm's premier Student Defense Team is available in Seattle, Spokane, Tacoma, Vancouver, Bellevue, Kent, Everett, Renton, Spokane Valley, Federal Way, Yakima, Kirkland, Bellingham, Auburn, and other Washington locations to defend your student against Washington high school disciplinary charges. Hundreds of students nationwide have wisely trusted us for a successful defense. Call 888.535.3686 or use our contact form now to tell us about your Washington high school student's case.
