Opinion ID: 2548249
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Education Code sections 48918 and 48915

Text: We first describe the relevant provisions of two statutes  Education Code sections 48918 and 48915  pertaining to the expulsion of students from public schools. Education Code section 48918 specifies the right of a student to an expulsion hearing and sets forth procedures that a school district must follow when conducting such a hearing. (Stats.1990, ch. 1231, § 2, pp. 5136-5139.) [2] In identifying the right to a hearing, subdivision (a) of this statute declares that a student is entitled to an expulsion hearing within 30 days after the school principal determines that the student has committed an act warranting expulsion. [3] In practical effect, this means that whenever a school principal makes such a determination and recommends to the school board that a student be expelled, an expulsion hearing is mandated. [4] In specifying the substantive and procedural requirements for such an expulsion hearing, Education Code section 48918 sets forth rules and procedures, some of which, the parties agree, codify requirements of federal due process and some of which may exceed those requirements. [5] These rules and procedures govern, among other things, notice of a hearing and the right to representation by counsel, preparation of findings of fact, notices related to the expulsion and the right of appeal, and preparation of a hearing record. (See § 48918, subds. (a) through former subd. (j) (currently subd. (k).) The second statute at issue in this matter is Education Code section 48915. Discrete subdivisions of this statute address circumstances in which a principal must recommend to the school board that a student be expelled, and circumstances in which a principal may recommend that a student be expelled. First, there is what the parties characterize as the mandatory expulsion provision, Education Code section 48915, former subdivision (b). As it read during the time relevant in this proceeding (mid-1993 through mid-1994), this subdivision (1) compelled a school principal to immediately suspend any student found to be in possession of a firearm at school or at a school activity off school grounds, and (2) mandated a recommendation to the school district governing board that the student be expelled. The provision further required the governing board, upon confirmation of the student's knowing possession of a firearm, either to expel the student or refer him or her to an alternative education program housed at a separate school site. [6] (Compare this former provision with current Ed.Code, § 48915, subds. (c) and (d).) [7] This provision, as it read at the time relevant here, did not mandate expulsion per se [8]  but it did require immediate suspension followed by a mandatory expulsion recommendation (and it provided that a student found by the governing board to have possessed a firearm would be removed from the school site by limiting disposition to either expulsion or referral to an alternative school). Moreover, as noted above, whenever expulsion is recommended a student has a right to an expulsion hearing. Accordingly, it is appropriate to characterize the former provision as mandating immediate suspension, a recommendation of expulsion, and hence, an expulsion hearing. For convenience, we accept the parties' description of this aspect of Education Code section 48915 as constituting a mandatory expulsion provision. The second aspect of Education Code section 48915 relevant here consists of what we shall call the discretionary expulsion provision. ( Id., former subd. (c), subsequently subd. (d), currently subd. (e).) During the period relevant in this proceeding (as well as currently), this subdivision of Education Code section 48915 recognized that a principal possesses discretion to recommend that a student be expelled for specified conduct other than firearm possession (conduct such as damaging or stealing school property or private property, using or selling illicit drugs, receiving stolen property, possessing tobacco or drug paraphernalia, or engaging in disruptive behavior). The former provision (like the current provision) further specified that the school district governing board may order a student expelled upon finding that the student, while at school or at a school activity off school grounds, engaged in such conduct. [9]