Court Opinion

ID: 9633440
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 11:47:49.984882+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:08:35.506922
License: Public Domain

Judge RULAND
specially concurring.
I concur with the result reached in the majority opinion. However, I write separately because I believe the rule announced in the majority opinion goes too far. In sum, I conclude that the mere touching of a teacher in an angry manner, standing alone, may not be deemed, as a matter of law, to constitute a serious threat to order in the school or the classroom in every case. Instead, to constitute a serious threat to order in the classroom or the school, I believe that more than one student must be physically present at the time the touching occurs.
One can foresee various factual situations in which a teacher is physically touched by a student who is angry but the touching does not pose a serious threat either to the teacher or to order in the classroom or in the school. In those cases, a physical response by the teacher may be inappropriate. Thus, a seven-year-old student with severe personal problems that are known to the teacher might place one hand on the teacher’s arm in the privacy of an office in expressing anger or frustration. In that case, a physical response might not only be inappropriate, but it could generate subsequent disorder by the student in the classroom and the school.
Thus, absent a situation in which the teacher is acting to prevent or protect from an assault, I would limit the rule announced in this opinion to the factual scenario in which more than one student is *1074present when the proscribed conduct occurs.