Court Opinion

ID: 9765677
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 04:13:30.58716+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:54:12.448047
License: Public Domain

Justice NEWBY
dissenting.
For over one hundred years, our courts have refrained from interfering with a disciplinary decision of our professional educators and elected officials unless that decision is shown to be irrational. Today’s majority decision unnecessarily departs from that practice. While I agree with the general proposition that school officials ought not remove a student from the public school system unless they have a proper reason for doing so, I disagree with the majority’s conclusion that our courts should second-guess our school officials’ reasonable disciplinary decisions. Accordingly, I respectfully dissent.
Plaintiff was disciplined for her involvement in a fight at South-side High School on 18 January 2008. According to her complaint, such behavior is a violation of the Student Code of Conduct Policy for the Beaufort County Schools (“the Policy”) and exposes her to a penalty of removal for up to ten days and a possible long-term suspension. Pursuant to the Policy, plaintiff was suspended for ten days and ultimately received a long-term suspension. Plaintiff filed a statutory administrative appeal, but her suspension was upheld.
Now plaintiff asserts a claim that the North Carolina Constitution mandates that she have access to an alternative education program while she is under long-term suspension.1 In her complaint plaintiff *389precisely contended that she has a fundamental right to “the opportunity to obtain a sound, basic education.” She alleged that defendants denied her that fundamental right by suspending her “through the end of the school year and denjying] her any access to educational services during her suspension.” She argued that the denial wás unconstitutional unless defendants “demonstrate that the denial is necessary to promote a compelling governmental interest.” Plaintiff sought injunctive and declaratory relief specifically tailored to this claim.
The trial court dismissed plaintiffs claim. The trial court determined, inter alia, that plaintiff’s claim should be dismissed under Rule 12(b)(6) because her allegations “fail to state a claim upon which relief may be granted.” The court provided three alternative grounds for its dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6). First, the court explained that the statutory administrative appeal afforded by our legislature to students under long-term suspension is an adequate state law remedy precluding plaintiff’s direct action under the North Carolina Constitution. Second, the court reasoned that defendants’ decision to deny plaintiff access to an alternative education program is not subject to strict scrutiny, and, relying on precedent from the Court of Appeals, concluded that there is “no affirmative duty to provide” access to such programs “absent a legislative mandate.” Third, the court stated that even if strict scrutiny were the appropriate standard, school officials may lawfully temporarily halt the provision of educational services, as occurred here.
The Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s decision to dismiss plaintiff’s claim under Rule 12(b)(6). King ex rel. Harvey-Barrow v. Beaufort Cty. Bd. of Educ., —N.C. App. —, —, 683 S.E.2d 767, 771 (2009). The Court of Appeals majority concluded that school disciplinary decisions are not subject to strict scrutiny. See id. at —, 683 S.E.2d at 770-71. Rather, that court relied upon its prior decision in In re Jackson, 84 N.C. App. 167, 352 S.E.2d 449 (1987), which held that school disciplinary decisions are subject to rational basis review. King,-N.C. App. at-, 683 S.E.2d at 770-71. The dissenting judge reasoned that our opinion in Leandro v. State, 346 N.C. 336, 488 S.E.2d 249 (1997), required that the decision denying plaintiff access to an alternative education program be subjected to strict scrutiny and concluded that plaintiff had adequately stated a claim. -N.C. App. at —, 683 S.E.2d at 772-73 (Geer, J., dissenting).
In my view, the Court of Appeals properly affirmed the trial court’s dismissal of plaintiff’s claim. As the majority observes, there *390is no fundamental, constitutional right to an alternative education program. Our precedent indicates that our courts review school disciplinary decisions for a rational basis. Because plaintiff has not alleged that defendants arbitrarily denied her access to an alternative education program, I would affirm the decision of the Court of Appeals.
We have historically refrained from intruding upon the reasonable disciplinary decisions of our local school officials. See Hutchins v. [Sch. Comm, of] Durham, 137 N.C. 78, 80, 137 N.C. 68, 70-71, 49 S.E. 46, 47 (1904) (citations omitted). For example, in Coggins ex rel. Coggins v. Board of Education, 223 N.C. 763, 769, 28 S.E.2d 527, 531 (1944), we explained that courts review school board disciplinary rules for “unreasonableness” and will intervene when faced with a “clearly arbitrary or unreasonable” regulation. Id. Aside from “the unreasonableness of such a rule,” we stated that complaints about disciplinary decisions of our local school officials “raise questions essentially political in nature, and the remedy, if any, is at the ballot box.” Id. As the majority notes, our historical deference accords with the practice in almost all our sister states.
Our recent decisions in Hoke County Board of Education v. State, 358 N.C. 605, 599 S.E.2d 365 (2004), and Leandro left intact the deference afforded the disciplinary decisions of school officials. In Hoke County and Leandro we elucidated our children’s fundamental right under the state constitution to a qualitatively sound basic education. Hoke Cty., 358 N.C. at 609, 599 S.E.2d at 373; Leandro, 346 N.C. at 346, 488 S.E.2d at 254 (citation omitted). We applied strict scrutiny to the alleged violations of that right in those cases. Hoke Cty., 358 N.C. at 609, 599 S.E.2d at 373; Leandro, 346 N.C. at 357, 488 S.E.2d at 261 (citation omitted). However, as the majority illustrates, there is a fundamental distinction between our schools failing to afford a qualitatively sound education and disciplining students following their misbehavior. Accordingly, Hoke County and Leandro did not raise the level of scrutiny to which we subject the disciplinary decisions of our local school officials.
The courts’ limited role in disciplinary matters safeguards the constitutional province of our coordinate branches of government. The people of this state have vested control and management of our public schools in the legislative and executive branches of our government. N.C. Const, art. IX, §§ 2(1), 5; see also Leandro, 346 N.C. at 357, 488 S.E.2d at 261 (“[T]he administration of the pub-*391lie schools of the state is best left to the legislative and executive branches of government.”).
Those branches have constructed a detailed scheme by which to operate our public schools so as to protect the schools’ paramount mission: education. To promote academic achievement by all students, our General Assembly has determined that “all schools should be safe, secure, and orderly.” N.C.G.S. § 115C-105.45 (2009). Accordingly, the legislature has required local school boards to adopt plans designed to maintain safety, id. § 115C-105.47(a) (2009), and “policies . . . governing the conduct of students,” id. § 115C-391(a) (2009). A student may be removed from our schools for a willful violation of the local school board’s policies governing conduct, subject to numerous procedural safeguards. Id. § 115C-391(c) (2009).
Students receive a myriad of procedural protections to guard against an erroneous determination of a school policy violation and the arbitrary imposition of discipline. The General Assembly has provided for several levels of review of a long-term suspension decision. See id. (requiring that a school principal and superintendent act together in issuing a long-term suspension); id. § 115C-391(e) (2009) (allowing a decision to issue a long-term suspension to be appealed to the local school board and making that decision subject to judicial review under Article 4 of Chapter 150B of the General Statutes). Like the board in Beaufort County, many local school boards have provided another level of procedural protection by allowing for an initial review hearing before a panel of central office administrators. The parent of a student recommended for expulsion or long-term suspension must also be given written notice of the proposed action. Id. § 115C-391(d5) (2009) (requiring the notice to contain information on the student’s conduct, the school’s conduct policy, the hearing process, the right to have an attorney represent the student, whether an advocate other than an attorney may assist the student, and the parent’s right to review the student’s school records). These procedural protections ensure that a student will not be subjected to the possibility of being excluded from all educational opportunities unless that student has actually committed a willful violation of school policy.
For those students found to have violated local school board policies, the General Assembly has provided for potential additional educational opportunities, despite no constitutional obligation to do so. Each local school board must create one alternative education program and adopt “guidelines for assigning students to” it. Id. *392§ 115C-47(32a) (2009). As the majority notes, the General Assembly has allowed local school boards to determine when it is “feasible and appropriate” to assign students subject to long-term suspension to the local school board’s alternative education program. Id.
The statutory structure enacted by the General Assembly affords local school officials flexibility in managing our public schools. That flexibility demonstrates a recognition that denial of admission to an alternative education program may act as an additional deterrent against disruptive behavior in our public schools. Further, it may serve to maintain a safe and orderly environment in an alternative school, especially in a case like the one presently before the Court in which numerous students were involved in a violent disturbance. Also, the legislature appears to understand that mandating alternative education, whether that means admission to an alternative school or participation in some other learning program, tailored to every student who has willfully violated school board policy could devour the already scarce resources available to our schools to provide all our children the opportunity to obtain a sound basic education. See Beaufort Cty. Bd. of Educ. v. Beaufort Cty. Bd. of Comm’rs, 363 N.C. 500, 501-02, 681 S.E.2d 278, 280 (2009) (illustrating the funding challenges facing our local boards of education).
Using its immense “history and expertise” in education, Hoke Cty., 358 N.C. at 645, 599 S.E.2d at 395, our General Assembly has, along with the various local school boards, accomplished a considerable task. As required when administering discipline in our schools, the political branches of our government have balanced divergent interests- — -including the misbehaving student’s interest in obtaining an education, other students’ interests in having an unimpeded opportunity to obtain an education, and the interests of all students, teachers, and administrators to interact in a safe environment- — with, inter alia, scarce financial, human, and capital resources. See Hoke Cty., 358 N.C. at 620, 599 S.E.2d at 379 (clarifying that the constitutional right we articulated in Leandro, the right to the opportunity to receive a sound basic education, is vested in all this state’s children).
To maintain this balance this Court should, as it has historically done, give reasonable deference to our coordinate branches of government and the professional educators and administrators retained to manage our public schools. Rational basis review gives appropriate deference while simultaneously ensuring that there is a legitimate *393reason for a student’s exclusion, allowing our school officials to administer our schools free of judicial micromanagement. On the other hand, under intermediate and strict scrutiny school officials must establish both the reason for their decision and that their reason is appropriately weighty. Such requirements unduly burden our school officials and place our trial courts in the position of second-guessing their decisions. Accordingly, the judicial branch should not determine whether school officials’ reason for denying a student access to alternative education as a disciplinary matter is “important” or “significant,” as opposed to “reasonable.” Such an intrusion will weigh heavily on both our courts and our schools. Coggins, 223 N.C. at 769, 28 S.E.2d at 531.
To be sure, there is much in the majority’s decision with which I agree. Initially, the majority correctly determines “that a fundamental right to alternative education does not exist under the state constitution.” Additionally, the majority properly recognizes that our constitution affords a right to equal educational access. However, I disagree that the equal educational access provision of our constitution mandates that plaintiff be told the reason for her exclusion from an alternative education program, a remedy she failed to request. Perhaps if plaintiff had alleged defendants treated her differently than those similarly situated because of some immutable characteristic, then our constitution would afford heightened scrutiny of defendants’ decision. But that is not the case before us.
In my view, today’s decision has altered the administrative framework established for our public schools by our constitution and our General Statutes. Plaintiff here concedes that defendants complied with all statutory obligations in the handling of her long-term suspension. Nonetheless, after today’s decision our local school boards and administrators have less control and flexibility in making disciplinary decisions than that granted to them by our legislature. Because I see no justification to depart from our well-settled precedent subjecting school disciplinary decisions to rational basis review, and because plaintiff did not allege defendants arbitrarily denied her access to an alternative education program, I would affirm the decision of the Court of Appeals concluding that the trial court properly dismissed plaintiff’s claim. Accordingly, I respectfully dissent.

. Plaintiff also alleged in the trial court that the statute under which she was excluded from school is unconstitutional, but she has since abandoned that claim.