New Illinois School Legislation Update
Illinois may still lack a budget, but Governor Rauner has been actively signing into effect legislation affecting Illinois school districts. Here's the MTBF&M list of key legislation, and our thoughts on its impact in your district.
- Student Discipline. P.A. 99-0456 (Effective 9-15-16). While it isn't in effect until the 2016 school year, this piece of legislation has generated a lot of buzz for school districts across the state and has inspired national headlines on "landmark changes" in student discipline issues. This legislation relating to student discipline gained significant media attention around the efforts to secure its passage, and the legislation seems to track the U.S. Department of Education and the Department of Justice efforts to push for fewer classroom removals and lower racial disparities in suspension and expulsion rates. Students impacted by student discipline were a major part of the efforts, as you may see in some of the components which seem designed around these students' specific stories and perhaps not reflective of actual general practices. MTBF&M's Annual School Law Seminar, set for April 14, 2016, will focus heavily on the specific legal framework for these new discipline requirements. The specifics for districts to be aware of now include:
- The law requires a school board to provide along with the written expulsion or suspension decision the specific reasons why removing the pupil from school is in the best interest of the school, and the rationale as to the specific duration of the expulsion or suspension.
- The new law limits out-of-school suspensions of three days or less to incidents where the student's presence in the school would pose a threat to school safety or a disruption to other students' learning opportunities.
- The law limits out-of-school suspensions of longer than three days and expulsions to cases where all other appropriate and available behavioral and disciplinary interventions have been exhausted and the student's continuing presence in the school would either pose a threat to the safety of other students and staff or substantially disrupt, impede, or interfere with the operation of the school.
- It requires that students who are suspended for longer than four school days shall be provided appropriate and available support services during the period of their suspension and have an opportunity to make up work for equivalent academic credit.
- Schools cannot encourage students to drop out for behavioral or academic reasons, a practice referred to as "counseling out."
- Schools cannot use fines and fees as a disciplinary consequence.
- The component of this legislation that has received the most media attention is the codification that "zero tolerance" policies leading to student suspension or expulsion may not be allowed (unless otherwise required by federal law or the Illinois School Code). However, this component has been fairly codified and widely-implemented such that most districts will not feel a significant change from their already case-by-case analysis of student discipline. This component is probably most heralded for its attempt to address racial disparities in exclusionary practices, and MTBF&M suggests that districts re-visit the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights guidance on addressing different treatment along the lines of race (there are two especially helpful flow charts that simplify the analysis).
- Closed Session for School Safety & Security. P.A. 99-0235 (Effective 1-1-16). This legislation allows for an Open Meetings Act exemption for school boards to discuss school building safety and security.
- Social Media & Student Privacy. P.A. 99-0460 (Effective 8-25-15). This legislation is in response to the national attention given to the Right to Privacy in the School Setting Act in Illinois that was put into place in the last year allowing schools to gain access to students' social media accounts. The new legislation prohibits elementary or secondary schools from requesting or requiring a student to provide a password or other related account information in order to gain access to the student's account or profile on a social networking website. Instead, it requires the school to provide notification to the student and parent/guardian that the school may conduct an investigation or require a student to cooperate in an investigation if there is specific information about activity on the student's social media account that violates a school disciplinary rule or policy. Cooperation appears to mean requiring the student to share specific content when specific information is reported.
- Civics Education. P.A. 99-0434 (Effective 1-1-16). This legislation adds at least one semester of civics education, which must be a separate class, but counts as part of the two-year social studies requirement, to the high school graduation requirements. There is currently a trailer bill, which has been passed by both houses and sent to the Governor, which changes the effective date to July 1, 2016 - meaning that the new requirement would apply to all 9th graders entering high school in the 2016-2017 school year.
- Concussion Safety. P.A. 99-0245 (Effective 8-3-15 - Note: pending legislation, currently passed by both houses on 10-20-15, would postpone the effective date to the 2016 school year, but until signed by the Governor or with no action by the Governor in sixty (60) days, the legislation remains in full effect). This law requires school boards to appoint a concussion oversight team to establish a return-to-play protocol for a student's return to interscholastic athletics in high school and junior high school and for return to the classroom after the student is believed to have experienced a concussion. The concussion oversight team is to include at least one physician, one school nurse, and the athletic trainer (if one is employed by the district). Students who have suffered a concussion are not eligible to participate in an athletic competition again until the student's parents have signed a form that acknowledges receiving and reading written information that explains concussion prevention and treatment. The law requires that a student must be removed from an interscholastic game or practice if a coach, physician, game official, athletic trainer, or parent believes that the student might have sustained a concussion and may not return until the student athlete is evaluated by a physician and all school concussion protocols have been implemented. The law requires all coaches, a nurse on the concussion oversight team, and all game officials to take a training course on concussions.
- The Illinois Association of School Boards has prepared a detailed Checklist for school districts to be educated on this act here.
- Religious Exemptions for Health Examinations and Immunizations. P.A. 99-249 (Effective 8-3-15). Parents who object to examination and immunization requirements must now submit a signed Certification of Religious Exemption detailing the grounds for objection and the specific examinations, immunizations or tests to which they object. The Certificate must also be signed by an authorized examining health care provider that s/he provided education to the parent on the benefits of immunization and health risks to the student and community of any objection. These requirements are clearly intended to chill the number of objections. The Illinois Department of Public Health has prepared the necessary Certificate of Religious Exemption, which parents must use.
- Lali's Law - Opioid Antagonist Administration. P.A. 99-480 (Effective 9-9-15). In the ongoing efforts to address drug addiction and overdose, a new and expansive piece of legislation attempts to holistically address the opioid epidemic. One major component provides increased access to the opioid antidote naloxone, and allows trained pharmacists to dispense naloxone to any person who comes to the pharmacy, hoping that this provision will make naloxone more available when and where it is needed to address an overdose. The law will implement a public education program intended to increase awareness about Illinois's overdose Good Samaritan law (which encourages bystanders to summon medical assistance by providing protection against criminal prosecution for certain offenses) and also attempts to increase access to drug courts that promote treatment over incarceration. The School Code provision authorizing self-administration and self-carry for asthma medication and epinephrine was amended to include administration of an opioid antagonist by a school nurse or trained personnel when that school nurse or trained personnel in good faith believes a person is experiencing an opioid overdose. It requires that the school inform parents in writing that the district and its employees and agents are immune from liability except in the event of willful and wanton conduct as a result of any injury arising from the administration of an opioid antagonist, and that parents must sign a statement acknowledging that the school district is not to incur liability. The legislation currently extends immunity when a school nurse or trained personnel administers an opioid antagonist where there has been a lack of notice or failure to secure a signed statement. The legislation allows the school nurse or trained personnel to carry and administer an opioid antagonist at any time in school or at a school-sponsored activity. Many details, including the supply of opioid antagonists at school, the notice when an opioid antagonist is used at school, the appropriate training to administer the antagonists, and school-wide training to be developed by ISBE, in addition to a specific ISBE-designed pilot program, are included in the Act.
- Truth in Taxation - Website Requirements. P.A. 99-367 (Effective 1-1-2016). This brief legislation adds to the notice and hearing provisions of the Truth in Taxation Law and requires a taxing district to post notice of proposed action on a tax levy on the taxing district's website (if there is a website "maintained by the full-time staff of the taxing district").