THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, October 9, 1995 TAG: 9510090026
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JON GLASS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 146 lines
A new state law meant to improve student discipline by requiring the involvement of parents has turned into a public relations disaster for Virginia's schools.
It has sparked angry responses from moms and dads. The parents of a teenage daughter in Roanoke County filed a lawsuit days after school began last month. And the American Civil Liberties Union has warned school districts not to enforce it.
The law, passed with bipartisan support in the 1995 General Assembly session, requires parents to sign a form agreeing to help school officials discipline unruly children. Failure to return the form carries a $50 penalty, and uncooperative parents could be fined up to $500.
Some parents regard the law as a not-so-veiled threat.
``Ask me to cooperate and I'll be glad to. Order me to cooperate and I'm going to get pretty upset,'' said Sheri D. Slinker, a mother of four children in Virginia Beach schools.
Amid the uproar, educators worry that the law's crucial purpose is being overshadowed: That kids can't learn in disruptive classrooms, and that parents of students must be involved with schools to bring order.
The negative reaction also is disturbs educators who worry about a growing distrust of school administrators and government in general.
``I regret that some parents have been offended by the language, but I hope we don't lose the message,'' state schools Superintendent William C. Bosher Jr. said.
School officials in South Hampton Roads said they feel caught in the crossfire. They said they probably will not attempt to enforce the law until the legal dust settles.
``We've decided to tell principals to stop pressing kids and parents'' for the signed forms, said Roy D. Nichols Jr., Norfolk schools superintendent.
``We are not making any plan to take anybody to court at this time,'' said J. Wylie French, director of alternative education and safe schools in Virginia Beach.
Despite the hackles raised, the majority of parents locally have signed and returned the notices, school officials said. Most parents got the notices from children returning home after the first day of school.
``Right now, we're getting a lot of them back with little nasty notes on the bottom of them - but we are getting them back,'' said Tom Cupitt, a spokesman for Chesapeake schools.
Educators say that, overall, most parents already are working with schools to manage children's behavior.
The law, Bosher said, was intended to give local schools teeth in those rare cases when parents ``willfully and unreasonably'' refuse to take responsibility for their children.
``There should be a tool available to schools to say to parents that `You just can't walk away from those children,' '' Bosher said. ``The intent never was to say that parents had to agree with everything the schools did.''
Parent Denise Matchen, president of the Norfolk Council of PTAs, said she has had her ``share of students losing out in the classroom because teachers were having to deal with disruptive children.''
``It's time,'' she said, ``that we make parents accountable for their children.''
Slinker, the Virginia Beach mom, said she signed the form because it was the law. But she did so ``under protest'' and sent a letter to school officials saying so.
In her Sept. 7 letter, Slinker objected to a ``bureaucratic, authoritarian, meddling law that effectively holds law abiding parents, students and teachers hostage to a few disobedient, disruptive miscreants.''
Slinker also asked why teachers and administrators aren't required to sign a document ``guaranteeing the students' acquisition of skill and knowledge, complete with boards of review and disciplinary fines.''
The Roanoke couple - Baptists who said they answered only to God for disciplining their children - sued the Roanoke County district on grounds that signing the local form amounted to a ``loyalty oath'' and violated their constitutional rights of religion and free speech.
Their case in U.S. District Court is pending.
``Our primary concern was to keep these parents from getting into trouble who for religious, moral and political grounds didn't want to sign,'' said Dean Whitford, staff counsel for the Charlottesville-based Rutherford Institute, which is representing the couple, Thomas and Deloras Whitt. ``We may continue ahead and challenge the statute itself.''
Whitford said the Whitts objected to signing a blanket statement agreeing to cooperate with schools because ``nobody knows what it means or how it will be used. It's subject to abuse by school officials.''
Bosher, the state superintendent, acknowledged that he may have inadvertently caused some of the outcry because most school districts modeled their forms on language suggested by his office.
Shortly after the suit was filed, the state attorney general's office told Bosher that the model statement his office sent to local districts to copy overstated the scope of the law.
The model recommended that districts ask parents to sign a ``contract'' including language to ``agree to cooperate with school officials in managing my child's conduct.''
In a Sept. 28 letter to Bosher, Deputy Attorney General William H. Hurd said the law ``says nothing whatsoever'' about entering into a contract with parents, and, as such, ``is not an enforceable legal agreement.''
``While the metaphorical use of the term may have helped underscore the idea that parents and school officials each have roles to play in maintaining proper student conduct,'' Hurd wrote, ``too much confusion and mistrust have been created.''
The most that school districts can require parents to do under the law is to sign a statement acknowledging that they had received a copy of the law and the district's standards of student conduct, Hurd wrote.
Many parents feared that the law required them to ``go along with school officials when it comes to disciplining their children,'' Hurd said, quoting concerns of the ACLU. But parents have a right to disagree, he said.
``If such a `loyalty oath' were required, I have no doubt that the statute would be unconstitutional,'' Hurd wrote. He added: ``Where the failure to comply is based on the good faith assertion of constitutional rights, no penalty is appropriate.''
Bosher said he will ask the General Assembly in January to amend the law to clarify that parents do not waive any rights by signing the forms.
In the meantime, Bosher said, the law remains in effect. If they choose, school districts can seek fines against parents as outlined by law and can haul parents into juvenile court for ``willful and unreasonable refusal to participate in efforts to improve the student's behavior . . . .''
Hurd advised school districts to consult their attorneys case-by-case before proceeding.
Bosher said, ``Young people will be the losers if we continue to battle over semantics among the big people.'' ILLUSTRATION: Graphic
WHAT THE LAW SAYS
The ``parental responsibility and involvement requirements'' are
contained in section 22.1-279.3 of the Virginia Omnibus Educational
Act of 1995. The law, passed during the 1995 General Assembly
session, states:
``Each parent of a student enrolled in a public school has a duty to
assist the school in enforcing the standards of student conduct and
attendance in order that education may be conducted in an atmosphere
free of disruption and threat to persons or property, and supportive
of individual rights . . .
``Each parent of a student shall sign and return to the school in
which the student is enrolled a statement acknowledging the
requirements of the school board's standards of student conduct and
recognizing his responsibility to assist the school in disciplining
the student and maintaining order, and acknowledging that failure to
so participate could result in court action against the student and
the parent . . . .''
KEYWORDS: VIRGINIA OMNIBUS EDUCATIONAL ACT OF 1995 PARENTAL ROLE LAW
DISCIPLINE LAW PUBLIC SCHOOLS NEW LAW < by CNB