Can a state require that the Ten Commandments be posted in every classroom? What does the Establishment Clause mean these days with the rise of the Free Exercise Clause and the impact of Kennedy v. Bremerton? Do you ever get deja vu? We do, because we swear we've already had this conversation. Today, we're discussing a recent case challenging Louisiana's requirement that every classroom display a prominent copy of the Ten Commandments. We've called these hydra laws; when one gets struck down, two more seem to pop up. Or we could call these groundhog day episodes. Whatever you want to call it, we’ve got another 1st Amendment religion case for you today! This is the case of Roake v. Brumley. That’s right, we’re back with another Church/State case…. Are we seeing a pattern yet? We also discuss some recent developments with the Supreme Court and the Trump administration's efforts to lay off more than 1,400 employees from the Department of Education.

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Need some education law content for your courses or professional development? We have a Teaching Guide! You can check it out at our website, ⁠ChalkandGavel.com⁠.

We'd also greatly appreciate it if you would consider supporting Chalk & Gavel by becoming a subscriber on Patreon. Your support will help us continue to deliver the education law content you want to hear! ⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/chalkandgavel⁠

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Keywords: Religion in Schools, Ten Commandments, Establishment Clause, Church/State Issues, Trump Administration, Department of Education Lay-offs

#educationlaw #k12 #podcast #ChalkandGavel #ReligionInSchools #TenCommandments #YouStillCantDoThat

We've got a special episode for you to celebrate our 50th episode! We're joined by none other than Mary Beth Tinker, one of the plaintiffs in the famous 1969 Supreme Court case, Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District. We've talked about Tinker so many times on this show; this is the case that set the standard for students’ free speech rights in schools. And to help us explore this case, who better than Tinker herself? Listen in as Mary Beth shares her story and talks about how she has spent her life supporting children and advocating for their rights. In this episode, we explore when schools can silence student speech, and whether a school, consistent with the First Amendment, can forbid the wearing of black armbands in protest of the Vietnam War. This is one you do not want to miss!

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Need some education law content for your courses or professional development? We have a Teaching Guide! You can check it out at our website, ⁠ChalkandGavel.com⁠.

We'd also greatly appreciate it if you would consider supporting Chalk & Gavel by becoming a subscriber on Patreon. Your support will help us continue to deliver the education law content you want to hear! ⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/chalkandgavel⁠

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Keywords: Student Activism, First Amendment Free Speech, Students' Rights, Tinker v. Des Moines, Mary Beth Tinker, Black Arm Bands, Vietnam War

#educationlaw #k12 #podcast #ChalkandGavel #studentactivism #protests #TinkerTour

Can schools control what students say at student protests? When is a student walkout a school-sponsored event? What’s the first rule about protesting against gun violence in schools? Apparently, the first rule of protesting gun violence is “don’t talk about gun violence.” At least according to the Shawnee Mission School District. Today’s case is another First Amendment student speech case. We’re heading to Kansas to look at what happened when students planned a walkout after the Parkland shooting, and the school, let’s say, got rather involved in that event, telling them what they could or could not talk about. We also discuss a handful of Supreme Court cases that address legal protections for transgender individuals, including the Supreme Court's recent decision in U.S. v. Skremmeti and two cases on transgender student athletes that will be heard next term.

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Need some education law content for your courses or professional development? We have a Teaching Guide! You can check it out at our website, ⁠ChalkandGavel.com⁠.

We'd also greatly appreciate it if you would consider supporting Chalk & Gavel by becoming a subscriber on Patreon. Your support will help us continue to deliver the education law content you want to hear! ⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/chalkandgavel⁠

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Keywords: Student Protests and Walkouts, First Amendment Free Speech, Students' Rights, School-Sponsored Events

#educationlaw #k12 #podcast #ChalkandGavel #studentactivism #protests

Jamie and Chris return for the third episode on the Mahmoud v. Taylor case! This time, we break down the recent Supreme Court Decision that came out at the end of the term. It was an interesting decision made by the Court's conservative majority, adding another (ambiguous) layer to decades of parental rights and school curriculum case law. We also discuss the AJT v. Osseo Supreme Court decision that eliminates the higher bar that parents needed to sue under the ADA and Section 504.

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Need some education law content for your courses or professional development? We have a Teaching Guide! You can check it out at our website, ⁠ChalkandGavel.com⁠.

We'd also greatly appreciate it if you would consider supporting Chalk & Gavel by becoming a subscriber on Patreon. Your support will help us continue to deliver the education law content you want to hear! ⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/chalkandgavel⁠

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Keywords: Supreme Court, Mahmoud v. Taylor, Oral Argument, LGBTQ Inclusive Curriculum, Religion, Parental Rights, Richard Katskee

#educationlaw #k12 #podcast #ChalkandGavel #SCOTUS #religionineducation #LGBTQ

What does the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, or FERPA, say about the practice of peer grading? When does something become an “educational record” protected under FERPA? Do you think the people who wrote FERPA knew we were going to call it 'FERPA'? Couldn’t they have come up with a better acronym? This is our first FERPA episode! This is the law that’s designed to protect the privacy of student records. So, what information is protected under FERPA, and what isn’t? Today’s case involves a parent who took issue with a teacher’s use of peer-grading, saying that it violated her children’s privacy and subjected them to unnecessary embarrassment. This is the Supreme Court case of Owasso Independent School District v. Falvo. We also discuss a recent decision out of the 5th Circuit that makes it more difficult to challenge the removal of books from a local library, at least in Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi.

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Need some education law content for your courses or professional development? We have a Teaching Guide! You can check it out at our website, ⁠ChalkandGavel.com⁠.

We'd also greatly appreciate it if you would consider supporting Chalk & Gavel by becoming a subscriber on Patreon. Your support will help us continue to deliver the education law content you want to hear! ⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/chalkandgavel⁠

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Keywords: Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), Education Records, Peer Grading, Libraries, Book Bans

#educationlaw #k12 #podcast #ChalkandGavel #FERPA #StudentRights #BUZZKILL

Can the U.S. Department of Education require schools to stop all DEI programs and activities? What do they actually mean when they say “DEI?” Are you ready to go three rounds on the injunction junction? We’ve got a three-fer for you today. Three cases for the price of none! We’re covering how three courts are dealing with the Trump Administration’s education directives to curtail DEI programs and initiatives in schools. In our bell-ringer for Episode 39, we talked about a Dear Colleague Letter from the U.S. Department of Education that purported to “reiterate existing legal requirements” under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act regarding racial discrimination. That letter seemed to lump DEI efforts in with intentional discrimination. Well, we now have three different court decisions halting the enforcement of that letter, so let's dig in! We also discuss the Supreme Court's decision in the Oklahoma virtual religious charter school case. (Go back and listen to Episode 44; our guest, Dr. Martha McCarthy, totally called it!) It's an interesting one. Not every Supreme Court decision is exactly two sentences long!

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Need some education law content for your courses or professional development? We have a Teaching Guide! You can check it out at our website, ⁠ChalkandGavel.com⁠.

We'd also greatly appreciate it if you would consider supporting Chalk & Gavel by becoming a subscriber on Patreon. Your support will help us continue to deliver the education law content you want to hear! ⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/chalkandgavel⁠

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Keywords: Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI), Title VI, Racial Discrimination, U.S. Department of Education, the Trump Administration, Administrative Law, Oklahoma, Religion, Charter Schools

#educationlaw #k12 #podcast #ChalkandGavel #DEI #Trump #InjunctionJunction

When can a school dismiss a teacher for good or just cause? What happens when a teacher’s iPhone with some, let's say, risque pictures, automatically syncs with his district-issued iPad? What could possibly go wrong? We've got another interesting case here today! This one involves a teacher who took some “naughty” pictures on his personal iPhone while on vacation, which later happened to be synced to a school-issued device (don't worry, though, no students saw them). Well, the proverbial cat got out of the bag, and he was reported to child protective services, who called school officials, and we’ll dig into how all that played out as we cover the case of the Board of Trustees of Lincoln County School District Number 2 v Earling. We also discuss a great EdWeek article that's tracking all of the lawsuits filed over Trump's education policies, conveniently titled, "See All the Lawsuits Filed Over Trump's Education Policies." Check it out here: https://www.edweek.org/policy-politics/see-all-the-lawsuits-filed-over-trumps-education-policies/2025/03

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Need some education law content for your courses or professional development? We have a Teaching Guide! You can check it out at our website, ⁠ChalkandGavel.com⁠.

We'd also greatly appreciate it if you would consider supporting Chalk & Gavel by becoming a subscriber on Patreon. Your support will help us continue to deliver the education law content you want to hear! ⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/chalkandgavel⁠

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Keywords: Teachers and Teacher Discipline, Labor and Employment, Good or Just Cause, Technology and Cell Phones

#educationlaw #k12 #podcast #ChalkandGavel #teachers

Is a charter school a public school? Does the Free Exercise Clause require taxpayers to fund charter schools that teach religion as truth? Is a charter school just a private organization with a state contract, or is it a state actor or even a governmental entity? Is Oklahoma on the brink of establishing the country’s first religious public school? Today, we’re tackling the oral arguments from another consequential Supreme Court case with some major implications for education. We usually only see these kinds of big ones every few years, but the Supreme Court is all-in on education these days. You’ve probably heard about this one, too, since it’s been all over the news (and all over Chalk & Gavel; we covered the OK Supreme Court's decision in this case in Episode 23). This one deals with a Catholic organization that was approved to operate a religious charter school by Oklahoma’s Charter School Review Board. Oklahoma's Attorney General, a republican named Gentner Drummond, believed that this violated the Establishment Clause and the state’s charter school law. This case went all the way to Oklahoma’s Supreme Court, which sided with Drummond, and that’s where most of us thought it would stay… but no, the U.S. Supreme Court decided to weigh in on the situation, and here we are. To help us break down those oral arguments, we’re honored to be joined by Dr. Martha McCarthy, a legend in education law who has been writing about religion and public schools since the 1980s! You don't want to miss this one!

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Need some education law content for your courses or professional development? We have a Teaching Guide! You can check it out at our website, ⁠ChalkandGavel.com⁠.

We'd also greatly appreciate it if you would consider supporting Chalk & Gavel by becoming a subscriber on Patreon. Your support will help us continue to deliver the education law content you want to hear! ⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/chalkandgavel⁠

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Keywords: Supreme Court, Oklahoma Statewide Charter School Board v. Drummond, Oral Argument, Religion, Free Exercise Clause, Establishment Clause, Charter Schools, Martha McCarthy

#educationlaw #k12 #podcast #ChalkandGavel #SCOTUS #religionineducation #schoolchoice