Education Portal for Students in India

Ashoka Kumar Thakur vs. Union of India and others (2008) 6 SCC 1. The Court decided that there is a fundamental right to receive education free from fear of security and safety, and the right to education incorporates the provision of safe schools pursuant to Articles 21 and 21A of the Constitution.
View complete answer

Which is the case related to right to education in India?

Administration In Indian Education System: – Initially the British Administration does not gave much importance to the education system. After Independence only it was raised to great extent. According to the 86th Amendment Act 2002, right to education was justified under the Article 14 and 21 as a part of fundamental right guaranteed to all citizens.

1. In Mohini Jain’s case.
2. Right To Education – Article 21(A):
3. In Shyam sundar case

Court said that state must have a responsibility to discharge its duty of providing educational institutions in all places of the state’s territory to educate all its citizen. And also court ordered that state must administrate the proper providing of educational institutions by itself or by giving to private education institutions to educate its citizens.

And also if the private institutions charge capitation fee then it is considered as a violation of article 14. As per 2015 research India occupies 92nd position in among 142 countries. Even the small nations are maintaining a proper educational system, till now India trying to reach its proper providing of education.

This article says state shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of six to fourteen years. Court tells that “right of a child should not be restricted only to free and compulsory education, but should be extended to have quality education without any discrimination on the ground of their economic, social and cultural background.

In J.P.Unnikrishnan’s case Court tells that the government institutions for being reluctant with the enforcement of Article 45 and held that every child who is deprived of the right to education can issue a writ of mandamus against the appropriate authority for the enforcement of their deprived right.4.

AIR 1993 SCR (1) 594 The administration activities in educational department in India was not much active. It must be developed by the proper planning by the executives. Though it was planned it does not exercise it properly, due to the corrupted hands in administration level.

• Conclusion:
• Suggestion:

So there must be a powerful and planned administration in education department. The first and foremost duty is to remove the persons who are involved in bribery, corruption, biased activities in the field of administration. It is possible only by the superior officers.

1. If we see who is in superior level automatically it shows the President (who gives the approval) and Prime Minister (under whose leadership a law was formulated, executed and maintained).
2. So from top to bottom all the authorities must have some good faith and welfare thoughts on its citizens to provide a proper education.

By concentrating on education part one country must develop all its other portions. Let’s we all wait and see the development of the education system in India. Even though the planning and administration was good, the execution must be properly done by the educational authorities.
View complete answer

In which case the Supreme Court held that right to education directly flows from the right to life?

Reasons behind RTE Act 2009 – · 1950, Constitution of India provided under article 45, as one of the Directive Principles of state policy. · 1968, First National Commission established for education under the supervision of Dr. Kothari and submits its reports (several changes).

1. · 1976, Constitutional Amendment for making education in a concurrent subject (responsibility of central and state)was passed.
2. · 1986, The National Policy on Education (NPE) supports to common school system (css) and was formulated but not implemented.
3. · 1993, The Supreme Court in the case of Mohini Jain and Unnikrishnan vs state of Andhra Pradesh ruled that the right to education is a fundamental right that flows from the Right to life in article 21 under Indian constitution.
4. · 1997, Constitutional Amendment for making education as a fundamental right was introduced.
5. · 2002, 86th Constitutional Amendment took place and insertion of Article 21A and brings changes in Article 45 and also added a new fundamental duty under Article 51A (k).
6. · 2005, CABE committee report established to draft the right to education bill submits its report.

View complete answer

How is right to education violated in India?

Provisions given in the Constitution promoting and strengthening the educational framework in India –

• Article 28: In our Constitution Article 28 provides freedom to attend any religious instruction or religious worship in educational institutions.
• Article 29 : This article gives equality of opportunity in educational institutions.
• Article 30 : Acknowledge the right of minorities to establish and administer educational institutions.
• Article 45: This article mandate the state shall dispense to provide within a period of ten years from the inception of this Constitution for free and compulsory education for all children of this country until they complete the age of 14 years. The responsibility for providing elementary education lies with the scope under state Government, the central Government, the Local Bodies and authorities, and voluntary organizations or any other government organization.
• Article 46: Talks about the special care for the furtherance of education and economic interests of the Scheduled Tribes, Scheduled Caste, OBC and the weaker sections of society.
• Article 337 : This article regulates the special provision with respect to educational grants for the benefit of the Anglo-Indian community.
• Article 350B: It provides for grants and offers for linguistic minorities.
• Article 351: This article deals with the development and promotion of the Hindi language.

This constitutional amendment is made with regard for protecting the citizens right of education, as we know the challenges in India regarding education, so it is quite necessary for the policymakers of this country to amend the constitution and bring some changes in educational policy, so that more people in India will get the right of education, and transforms their lives towards a better future.86th constitutional amendment act, 2002 brings three new changes in our constitution, for the better functioning, and to facilitate a better understanding of the right to free and compulsory education to the children age group between six to fourteen.

1. Insertion of new Article i.e, 21A in part III of the Indian constitution, which provides that every child has the right to free and compulsory education of equitable quality and subject to some norms and standards.
2. Bring alteration and modification in Article 45 and substituted as the State shall endeavor to assure early childhood care and free and compulsory education for all children until they complete the age of six years.
3. Adding the new clause, (K) under Article 51A, the result of this new fundamental duty is added which states that whosoever is a parent or guardian has a duty to furnish opportunities for education to his child or, as the case may be, ward between the age group of six to fourteen years.

In Shyam Sundar case

Court held that the “right of a child should not confines only to free and compulsory education, but should be enhanced to have quality education without any discrimination on the basis of their economic, social and cultural background. The State of Madras v.

Shrimati Champakam Dorairajan, in this case the supreme court gives a landmark judgment. This judgment results in the First Amendment of the Constitution. Here the court held that providing such contradictory reservations was the reason for infringement of Article 29(2) of the Indian Constitution, Court held: Fundamental rights are sacred and can not be a subject to abridged by any legislative or executive action or order except provided in part III.

directive principles of state policy have to be uniform and should be run on a subsidiary basis related to a fundamental right. However, if there is no infringement/violation of rights conferred by part III of the Indian constitution, there can be no objection over, the state acting in accordance with the directive principles of state policy.

1. Is there a clause of ‘right to education’ guaranteed to the people of India provided in the Constitution?
2. If so, does the aspect of ‘capitation fee’ implied in the same?
3. Whether putting of capitation fee in regard to admission to educational institutions is arbitrary, unjust, and unfair and such violates the equality clause provided in Article 14 of the Constitution?

The division bench of the Supreme Court said that the ‘right to life ‘ is an essential element for all those rights which the Courts must enforce as they are important to the dignified enjoyment of life. The right to education moves directly from the right to life.

The right to life provided under Article 21 and the dignity of an individual life is not being achieved unless it is tossed and coupled with the right to education. Education in India can not be a product for sale. We hold that every citizen of India has the ‘right to education’ under the Constitution.

The State is under a legal obligation to formed educational institutions to enable the citizens to enjoy the right mentioned above. The State may discharge its duty through State-owned or State-recognised educational institutions. When the State Government gives grants recognition to the private educational institutions it mandates an agency to fulfill its duty given and mentioned under the Constitution. Click Above Court also observed that the Constitution made it compulsory to give education to all its citizens. This interpretation solely would assist the people to metamorphose the objectives of political economic and social justice. And charging capitation fee of large sums by institutions of higher education is a repudiation of the right to education.

The Supreme Court observed the validity of the verdict given by the court in Mohini Jain in the case of Unnikrishnan. The bench of five Judges by 3-2 majority partially agreed with the Mohini case decision and held that right to education is a fundamental right under Article 21 of the Constitution as it directly flows from “right to life”.

As considered, the court partially overruled the Mohini Jain’s decision and observed that the right to free and compulsory education is available only to children until they complete the age of 14 years, after that the responsibility of the State to provide education is subject to the limits of its economic capacity.
View complete answer

What is the case against education about?

Book details In this explosive book, Bryan Caplan argues that the primary function of education is not to enhance students’ skill but to certify their intelligence, work ethic, and conformity ―in other words, to signal the qualities of a good employee.
View complete answer

What court case was the key to accessing education?

On May 17, 1954, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren delivered the unanimous ruling in the landmark civil rights case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. State-sanctioned segregation of public schools was a violation of the 14th amendment and was therefore unconstitutional.
View complete answer

Which Supreme Court case in 1973 held that there is no fundamental right to education?

Alan Lomax, photographer. Mexican girls, San Antonio, Texas.1934. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. The 5-4 United States Supreme Court decision in San Antonio ISD v. Rodriguez ( 1973) ruled no constitutional right to an equal education, held no violation of rights in Texas’ school system, and reserved jurisdiction and management of Texas’ public school finance system to the state.

1. On July 10, 1968, Demitrio Rodriguez and a group of San Antonio parents filed a class action lawsuit on behalf of minority students from low-income school districts.
2. Their attorney, Arthur Gochman, denounced Texas’ inequitable public school finance system, and showed that the Edgewood district, with a predominantly Mexican-American population, and one of the highest tax rates in the Bexar Country, received $37 per pupil, while the more affluent and Anglo students in Alamo Heights got $413 per pupil.

A three-judge federal district court ruled in favor of the plaintiffs finding Texas’ public school finance system discriminatory based on wealth. They argued this inequity was unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. Additionally, they ruled that education is a “fundamental” right.

The State of Texas appealed the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. On March 21, 1973, Justice Powell delivered the Supreme Court decision stating that the “Equal Protection Clause does not require absolute equality of precisely equal advantages”. Furthermore, the court ruled that the State of Texas had not “deprived” any student access to education, an entity not protected by the 14th Amendment.

They also found no occurring discrimination on the basis of wealth, and retained management of school funding methods to the state and its representatives. In 1984, Rodriguez v. San Antonio ISD (1973) led to another U.S. Supreme Court landmark case: Edgewood Independent School District v.
View complete answer

Who introduced right to education Bill?

The Right to Education Bill, 2008 The Bill was introduced in the Rajya Sabha on December 15, 2008 and was referred to the Standing Committee on Human Resource Development (Chairperson: Shri Janardan Dwivedi). The Standing Committee is scheduled to submit its report within three months. Please see our Legislative Brief on the draft Right to Education Bill, 2005.
View complete answer

Is education a civil rights issue?

Your Right to Equality in Education Getting an education isn’t just about books and grades – we’re also learning how to participate fully in the life of this nation. (We’re tomorrow’s leaders after all!) But in order to really participate, we need to know our rights – otherwise we may lose them.

The highest law in our land is the U.S. Constitution, which has some amendments, known as the Bill of Rights. The Bill of Rights guarantees that the government can never deprive people in the U.S. of certain fundamental rights including the right to freedom of religion and to free speech and the due process of law.

Many federal and state laws give us additional rights, too. The Bill of Rights applies to young people as well as adults. And what I’m going to do right here is tell you about EQUAL TREATMENT, DO ALL KIDS HAVE THE RIGHT TO AN EQUAL EDUCATION? Yes! All kids living in the United States have the right to a free public education.

And the Constitution requires that all kids be given equal educational opportunity no matter what their race, ethnic background, religion, or sex, or whether they are rich or poor, citizen or non-citizen. Even if you are in this country illegally, you have the right to go to public school. The ACLU is fighting hard to make sure this right isn’t taken away.

In addition to this constitutional guarantee of an equal education, many federal, state and local laws also protect students against discrimination in education based on sexual orientation or disability, including pregnancy and HIV status. In fact, even though some kids may complain about having to go to school, the right to an equal educational opportunity is one of the most valuable rights you have.
View complete answer

Is right to education under right to freedom?

The Constitutional 86th Amendment Act, 2002 added Article 21A. The right to education is a fundamental right to freedom under Article 21A. The Article provides that ‘the State shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of 6 to 14 years in such a manner as the State may, by law, determine.’
View complete answer

Is education a human rights violation?

Education is recognised internationally as a fundamental human right, but according to the United Nations Children’s Fund, 130 million children of school-age in the developing world and 21 percent of all school age children, had no access to basic education in 1998.
View complete answer

What were the 5 cases in Brown v Board of Education?

The Case that Changed America – May 17, 1954, the day the decision in the Brown v. Board of Education case was issued, marks a defining moment in the history of the United States. The Supreme Court declared the doctrine of “separate but equal” unconstitutional and gave LDF the most celebrated victory in the organization’s storied history of fighting for civil rights.

The Supreme Court’s unanimous decision in Brown v. Board of Education occurred after a hard-fought, multi-year campaign to persuade all nine justices to overturn the “separate but equal” doctrine that their predecessors had endorsed in the Court’s infamous 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson decision. This campaign was conceived in the 1930s by Charles Hamilton Houston, then Dean of Howard Law School, and brilliantly executed in a series of cases over the next two decades by his star pupil, Thurgood Marshall–the man who became Legal Defense Fund’s first Director-Counsel and a Supreme Court Justice.

Brown itself was not a single case, but rather a coordinated group of five lawsuits against school districts in Kansas, South Carolina, Delaware, Virginia, and the District of Columbia.
View complete answer

Which case gave equal protection in the education system?

Activity – As a condition of re-joining the Union after the Civil War, former Confederate states had to ratify what have become known as the “Civil War” Amendments. The Thirteenth Amendment ended slavery; the Fourteenth Amendment granted citizenship to and protected the civil rights of former slaves; and the Fifteenth gave adult black men the right to vote.

• Unfortunately, the amendments alone proved insufficient to protect African Americans’ rights.
• Beginning in 1877, laws curbing the civil rights of Blacks began sweeping through Southern state legislatures.
• These laws became known as “Jim Crow” laws after a black minstrel character.
• Segregation became a legal requirement and not merely a cultural norm in every Southern state as well as some Northern ones.

In 1896, Homer A. Plessy challenged a Louisiana statue necessitating separate rail cars for black and white passengers. Plessy claimed the law violated the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection clause, which requires that a state must not “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” The Supreme Court disagreed with Plessy’s argument and instead upheld the Louisiana law.

• In the process, the Court established the doctrine of “separate but equal.” Though the Plessy v.
• Ferguson (1896) decision never actually used that famous phrase, the ruling upheld the constitutionality of racially separate public accommodations as long as those accommodations were otherwise equal.
• The lone dissenting Justice in Plessy, John Harlan, objected to the majority’s decision: “n view of the Constitution, in the eye of the law, there is in this country no superior, dominant, ruling class of citizens.

There is no caste here. Our constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law.” Public schools were able to remain segregated under the Plessy ruling. As public education became more common in the Twentieth Century, the Supreme Court’s “separate but equal” doctrine began to have more of an effect on children.

1. Black schools and white schools often received disproportionate funding from state and local governments.
2. In Washington DC, lack of new construction caused overcrowding in black schools, while nearby white schools were under-used.
3. In the Twentieth Century, community-based groups paired with the NAACP to conduct targeted legal challenges to the “separate but equal” doctrine.

Their goal was to overturn the “separate but equal” doctrine by building a case that would force the Supreme Court to declare that even if accommodations were “equal” in other ways, segregation itself was unconstitutional. One of the most promising fronts was in the arena of public education.

• Topeka, Kansas’ school system provided the perfect case because the school buildings, textbooks, materials and teacher salaries were virtually equal in black and white schools.
• Topeka’s Board of Education operated under an 1879 law, “Schools in Unorganized Counties,” that permitted, but did not require, segregation.

In 1951, thirteen parents sued on behalf of their twenty children. Oliver Brown, father of third-grader Linda Brown, became the named plaintiff. After making its way through the District Courts, the Brown case went to the Supreme Court. In 1954, sixty years after Plessy v.

Ferguson, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in Brown v. Board of Education that “separate but equal” was unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Court cited a series of tests performed by two psychologists, Kenneth and Mamie Clark, demonstrating that segregation had a negative effect on the psyche of black children, instilling in them a sense of inferiority: “To separate from others of similar age and qualifications solely because of their race generates a feeling of inferiority as to their status in the community that may affect their hearts and minds in a way unlikely ever to be undone.” Plessy was officially overturned, as separate accommodations were judges to be “inherently unequal.” Writing for the unanimous Court, Justice Earl Warren stated, “Segregation of children in public schools solely on the basis of race deprives children of the minority group of equal educational opportunities, even though the physical facilities and other ‘tangible’ factors may be equal.

The ‘separate but equal’ doctrine adopted in Plessy v. Ferguson has no place in the field of public education.” After the 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education declared state-mandated segregation in public schools unconstitutional, the case was re-argued to determine how to correct the violations.

In a directive known as Brown II, the Supreme Court ordered District Courts to determine whether local governments were pursuing integration “with all deliberate speed.” Some states and localities began earnest efforts to integrate, while others used the “deliberate speed” provision to delay integration.

In the case of Little Rock Arkansas, integration came only after the President mobilized the National Guard to enforce it.
View complete answer

What was the complaint in Brown v Board of Education?

By Jean Van Delinder – “Today, education is perhaps the most important function of state and local governments.” —Chief Justice Earl Warren, Opinion on Segregated Laws Delivered May 1954 When the United States Supreme Court handed down its unanimous decision in the landmark Brown v.

• Board of Education of Topeka case fifty years ago this spring, it thrust the issue of school desegregation into the national spotlight.
• The ruling that “separate educational facilities are inherently unequal” brought racial issues into the forefront of the national consciousness as never before and forced all Americans to confront a racially divided society and undemocratic social practices.

At the same time, the decision opened the floodgates of decades of school desegregation suits in both the North and the South. But the ruling did much more than that. It gave impetus to a young civil rights movement that would write much of American history during the next few decades.

The school segregation issue was ripe for being brought to the first tier of social concerns. Elsewhere in American society, segregation was breaking down. Important steps were taken in 1941, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 8802, forbidding racial discrimination by any defense contractor and establishing a Fair Employment Practices Committee as a regulatory agency to investigate charges of racial discrimination.

In 1947, Major League Baseball saw its first black player in Jackie Robinson, In 1948, President Harry S. Truman ordered the desegregation of the armed forces, which had already seen black and white Americans fighting side by side in World War II. That same year, under the guise of states’ rights, racial issues split the Democratic Party.

School segregation came at a high cost even outside of the human costs. For example, school districts had to maintain two school systems within one geographical area. Prior to 1954, Topeka, Kansas, maintained half-empty classrooms in segregated schools in order to keep the races separate. After Brown, this pattern continued with racism disguised as “freedom of choice”—justifying building new schools in outlying areas as merely a response to the population shift to new subdivisions rapidly being built in the western areas of the city (which turned out to be predominantly white and upper class).

Left behind were the less affluent, primarily black, residents who had little choice but to send their children to outdated and increasingly inferior schools. Brown also caused Americans to revisit the role of the national government in regulating local issues.

1. Century-old arguments, reminiscent of the debates over slavery, were revived to defend the primacy of states’ rights over federal jurisdiction.
2. The same language used to defend slavery was now being used to defend segregation.
3. Words like “interposition” and “nullification”—which hadn’t been heard for more than a century—were used to defend school segregation.1 Just as the Civil War caused Americans to confront the ugly reality of slavery, so too did Brown inspire Americans to confront its undemocratic system of education.

In recognizing the importance of education as the foundation of a democratic society, the Brown decision expressed the sentiments of Thomas Jefferson that publicly funded education was to be the primary mechanism to develop a natural elite and to ensure that the new republic had a literate citizenry regardless of social class.

Jefferson’s beliefs were reflected in the words of Chief Justice Earl Warren, who justified the significance of education in the Brown decision as being “the very foundation of good citizenship.” 2 The Topeka Brown case is important because it helped convince the Court that even when physical facilities and other “tangible” factors were equal, segregation still deprived minority children of equal educational opportunities.

Over the years, numerous scholars have traced the history of the Brown case and analyzed its impact as federal legislation. Yet most of these studies have been written from a national perspective, distant from the day-to-day life of the local people most affected by school desegregation.

1. The Topeka Brown records provide a glimpse of what people were doing in their local communities, where the struggle for racial justice was a continuing reality, year in and year out.
2. The records help us to understand the reality of school segregation in places like Topeka, where it was only legal in the elementary schools.

What was the effect of “separate-but-equal”? Overview of the National Case before the Supreme Court In October 1952, the Supreme Court announced it would hear five pending school desegregation cases collectively. In chronological order, the five consolidated cases were 1949: Briggs et al.v.

1. Elliott et al.
2. South Carolina); 1950: Bolling v.
3. Sharpe (District of Columbia); 3 May 1951: Davis et al.v.
4. County School Board of Prince Edward County, Virginia, et al.
5. Virginia); June 1951: Brown v.
6. Board of Education of Topeka (Kansas); October 1951: Gebhart et al.v.
7. Belton et al.
8. Delaware).
9. These cases all document inadequate funding for segregated schools—meaning that many black children lacked playgrounds, ball fields, cafeterias, libraries, auditoriums, and other amenities provided for white children in newer schools.

In Summerton, South Carolina, and Hockessin, Delaware, school buses were only provided for whites, while black children had to walk. In Claymont, Delaware, and Farmville, Virginia, there was no senior high school for black pupils. The Brown case of Topeka, Kansas, itself included twelve other plaintiffs besides Oliver Brown, whose daughter Linda was being bused twenty-one blocks from her home to a segregated school.

1. The nearest school in her neighborhood was only a few blocks away, but it was for whites only.
2. All of these cases were appealed to the Supreme Court, and the first round of arguments were held December 9–11, 1952.
3. The following June, the Supreme Court ordered that a second round of arguments be heard in October 1953.

When Chief Justice Fred Vinson, Jr., died unexpectedly of a heart attack in September, President Dwight D. Eisenhower nominated California Governor Earl Warren to replace Vinson. The Court rescheduled Brown v. Board arguments for December. On May 17, 1954, the Court declared that racial segregation in public schools violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, effectively overturning the 1896 Plessy v.

• Ferguson decision mandating “separate but equal.” The Brown ruling directly affected legally segregated schools in twenty-one states.
• In 1954, seventeen states had laws requiring segregated schools (Texas, Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware), and four other states had laws permitting rather than requiring segregated schools (Kansas, Arizona, New Mexico, and Wyoming).

Kansas’s state statutes restricted segregated elementary schools only to cities, such as Topeka, that had populations of more than fifteen thousand. Though the 1954 ruling declared racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional, it did not specify how this was to be remedied.

Originally the Court scheduled arguments on this subject for later in the year, but it did not hear what would become the third round of arguments in Brown until April 1955.4 On the last day of its term, the Supreme Court ordered desegregation to begin with “all deliberate speed.” In the intervening year, the District of Columbia and some school districts in other states had voluntarily begun to desegregate their schools.

However, state-sanctioned opposition to desegregation was already well under way in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Virginia, where the Court’s decision had been declared “null, void, and no effect.” Across the South, schools were closed and public education was suspended.

Public funds were disbursed to parents to subsidize the education of their children in private schools. Some states even went so far as to impose sanctions on anyone who implemented desegregation. Effects of the Supreme Court Decision in Kansas In Topeka, resistance to desegregation was more indirect, subtle, and covert.

Historically, the color line in Kansas was more permeable than it was South Carolina or Virginia. Its “border state” ideology was directed more toward racial collegiality and inclusion than animosity and exclusion. Kansas had relatively permissive segregation statutes (compared to some southern states).

• For example, segregation was permitted in elementary schools where the population exceeded fifteen thousand (cities of the first class).
• The one segregated high school—Sumner High School in Kansas City, Kansas—had been established in 1905 after a special act of the legislature allowed segregation of a secondary school in this one instance.

However, Kansas’s permissive racial statutes served to disguise the underlying reality of an unwritten code of racial separation that rivaled locales where total de jure public segregation was practiced. Topeka’s continued segregation of its public school system after Brown illustrates how the dismantling of a de jure system of segregation does not necessarily include the end of racist social practices.

1. Over the several decades following Brown, covert opposition to desegregation was carried out under cover of school redistricting and convoluted attendance boundaries.
2. It was also aided by real estate developers riding the postwar housing boom, who urged white Topekans to buy new houses and move to the newer—and racially homogenous—western suburbs.

The City of Topeka obliged this migration by annexing western territory several times between 1950 and 1979. There was a corresponding rise in demand for more schools from the Topeka Board of Education and its successor, Unified School District #501. Between 1957 and 1966, Topeka witnessed the creation of an “alternative predominantly white, school sub-system generally around the peripheral boundary but specifically concentrated in the southern and western portions of the Topeka school system.” New schools built after 1959 would have pupil racial ratios that would be all or disproportionately white.

Additionally, classroom additions and portable classrooms would be primarily placed at disproportionately white schools. Though the official end of segregation in 1954 met with far less hostility in Kansas than in Mississippi or South Carolina, African Americans still encountered obstacles. News correspondent Carl T.

Rowan had found Topeka to be a “pretty segregated city” when he lived there as a navy trainee during World War II. Returning to Kansas in 1953, he described his earlier experiences by observing, “Topeka was a paradox. There was no Jim Crow in some areas where you had expected it; segregation had deep roots where it was not expected.” The state’s permissive segregation laws meant that overt segregation was strictly limited, while covert segregationist practices arose unrestrained.

There was no segregation on city buses, or in any public transportation,” Rowan recalled. “But I was unable to go to a movie or into a restaurant with white navy buddies. Hotels, bowling alleys and other public recreation facilities were closed to Negroes.” A decade later and just a few months before the first Brown decision, Rowan still found it difficult to find a restaurant willing to serve him and his companion, attorney Charles Scott, the original lawyer involved in the Brown case.

Despite the legal demise of segregation, informal segregation was still intact. Rowan and Scott were asked by one restaurant owner to eat in the kitchen not because of any law requiring racial separation, but simply because it was his “policy.” As an attorney, Scott understood that it was much easier to remove segregation laws than to confront and change the informal racial practices that permeated the embarrassing day-to-day reality of racial segregation.

“And it stems from Jim Crow schools,” Scott declared to Rowan as they left one restaurant without being served, “because when segregation is part of the pattern of learning it permeates every area of life.” Early Challenges to School Segregation in Topeka: 1900–1950 In Kansas, the antecedents of the Brown case can be traced back through eleven previous lawsuits challenging segregation.

Beginning in 1880, these suits all challenged the legality of school segregation as it was practiced in Kansas.5 Of the three cases that involved Topeka’s schools, two are especially relevant to the Brown case. The earliest case, dating from 1901, involved the introduction of segregation in recently annexed areas (the Reynolds case), and the other case (the Graham case in 1940) involved the decision of whether or not junior high schools fell under the state’s segregation statutes.

Similar patterns of racial upheaval and containment, begun with the annexation issues related to the Reynolds case and the limitation of segregation to elementary schools as illustrated by the Graham case, continued throughout the Brown litigation. The issues involved in both of these cases were the effect of segregation itself on public education, the system of social practices that had arisen around it, and whether segregation as it existed was a violation of the due process clause in the Fourteenth Amendment, the same issues involved in the Brown decision.

“In approaching this problem,” Chief Justice Warren wrote in 1954, “we cannot turn the clock back to 1868 when the Amendment was adopted, or even to 1896 when Plessy v. Ferguson was written. We must consider public education in the light of its full development and its present place in American life throughout the Nation.

• Only in this way can it be determined if segregation in public schools deprives these plaintiffs of the equal protection of the laws.” In Kansas, both the Reynolds and Graham cases illustrate the development of the issues that came to fruition nationally in the Brown case.
• The Reynolds Case On February 1, 1901, William Reynolds tried to enroll his eight-year-old son Raul in the new school that was reserved for whites.

When he was refused, Reynolds filed suit on behalf of his son. In the complaint, the court record stated that Because of race and color, and for no other reason whatever, his child has been and is excluded from attending school in said new building by the express order and direction of said board,

thus putting publicly upon the plaintiff and his child the badge of a servile race, and holds them up to public gaze as unfit to associate, even in a public institution of the state, with other races and nationalities, in violation of the thirteenth and fourteenth amendments to the constitution of the United States, and, in violation of said fourteenth amendment, denies to the plaintiff and his child the equal protection of the laws.

The context behind the Reynolds suit was related to the geographical circumstances of Topeka. The westward growth of Topeka was caused in part by its being geographically constrained by the Kansas River to its north and southeast. Due to the contours of its flood plain, the least desirable land was north and east of the city, an area that came to be predominately African American.

The more desirable land—which rarely flooded—was toward the west and south, and was predominately white. This pattern of settlement would continue throughout the twentieth century. In the 1890s, the city of Topeka annexed part of a rural district, No.91, south and west of the town’s center, locally known as the “Lowman Hill District.” Being a rural district, No.91 did not have segregated schools.

After annexation it continued to be integrated because “it did not become convenient or expedient to make provision for separate schools, until the said school building was destroyed by fire.” After a fire occurred on July 20, 1900, the district implemented segregation by ordering that the fifty African American children living in the area be forced to attend classes in an old building that had been moved to the original site of the burnt-out school and outfitted with second-hand furniture.

1. The district then built a new school for the 130 white children living in the area, which brought about the Reynolds suit.
2. Reynolds ultimately lost his case, and his son had to attend a segregated school.
3. The school board argued that the new school building was larger and more centrally located in order to accommodate the white children, who outnumbered the African American children living in the area.

We see that as early as 1901, the parents of white children were able to enjoy the benefits of sending their children to newer, neighborhood schools while the parents of African American children had to send their children to segregated schools, many of which were not located close to where they lived.

• The Graham Case Just as land annexation resulted in a challenge to segregation, so too did the shift toward junior high curriculum bring another challenge to Topeka’s segregated schools with the Graham case.
• When the segregation statutes were first written in 1861 and later modified in 1879, junior high schools did not exist, and very few people of any race went on to high school.

The subsequent redefinition of state segregation statutes after 1940 was in response to an innovation in the institutional structure of public education accompanied by rapidly increasing enrollments in secondary and post-secondary institutions. When Topeka adopted the junior high system, it implemented a different educational curriculum for seventh and eighth grade students based on race.

1. White students were provided with a 6-3-3 system, consisting of six years of elementary or grade school, three years of junior high school, and three years of senior high school.
2. Black children were under an 8-1-3 plan.
3. The 8-1-3 plan meant that African American children in Topeka remained in segregated schools through the eighth grade, choosing either to enter an integrated ninth grade at Boswell Junior High or remain in a segregated class by electing to attend Roosevelt Junior High.

White children who left elementary school after sixth grade and attended junior high school were consequently introduced to a much more specialized curriculum. The court transcript of the Graham case illustrates the differences between the segregated elementary schools and the junior high schools.

When the plaintiff, who had just finished sixth grade, tried to enroll in Boswell Junior High School, he was refused admittance on the basis of his race. He filed suit, claiming the course of instruction offered at Buchanan Elementary was not equal to that available at Boswell Junior High.Boswell was a new facility and built for the express purpose of being a junior high.

It contained many more classrooms than the elementary schools, allowing for students to change classes for specialized teaching. In the segregated schools, one instructor taught most of the subjects. At segregated Buchanan School, one teacher taught most of the math and English courses, while at Boswell Junior High School different instructors taught all these subjects.

In the testimony provided by witnesses in the Graham case, the home economics teacher at Buchanan, Miss Ruth Ridley, reported that though her students were well prepared when they graduated from the eighth grade, they did not have facilities comparable to the better equipped and more up-to-date sewing and cooking rooms at Boswell.

Graham won his case: The junior highs in Topeka were legally desegregated. However, the effect was uncertain—desegregation did not include the teaching and administrative staff. For example, after the Graham case, eight African American teachers lost their jobs due to the integration of the junior highs.

• The assumption that the curriculum was not equal to the white schools reflected poorly on the high dedication and exemplary training of the black teachers, which many of them rightly resented.
• At two of the four segregated schools in Topeka, more of the teachers held master’s degrees than at any of the white grade schools.

Though no formal policy existed to not hire black teachers, it soon became obvious in Topeka that the number of African American teachers slowly dwindled after April 1953. Before the Brown decision, Topeka had 27 African American teachers who taught 779 students.

1. By 1956, the number of African American pupils had increased to 898, but the number of full-time teachers had declined to 21.
2. After the desegregation of the elementary schools in 1954, for most black teachers in Topeka and elsewhere, Brown did not result in integration; it still meant segregation or even worse, unemployment.

This decline in employment of black teachers after integration is a largely unacknowledged fact of desegregation. Contemporary Challenges to School Segregation in Topeka: 1950–1985 By 1950, the Topeka school system had twenty-two elementary schools (9.6 percent black), six junior high schools (9.9 percent black), and one senior high school (7.6 percent black).

As permitted by state law, racial segregation of students at the elementary level was strictly adhered to. The four schools that were maintained for black students were Buchanan, McKinley, Monroe, and Washington. Each of these four schools was geographically located in predominately black areas, although students were brought in from throughout the system.

Five of the eighteen white elementary schools were located in predominately white areas, while the remaining thirteen schools, though reserved exclusively for whites, were located in racially mixed neighborhoods. Segregation was maintained at a considerable cost as the four segregated elementary schools had much smaller student enrollments than their white counterparts.

• In 1950, all four of the segregated schools had an average of 143 pupil spaces underutilized, while the all-white schools were much more crowded, averaging only 28 spaces underutilized.
• The average black school had an enrollment of 165 students, while the white schools had an average enrollment of 342.

Topeka did not use the available classroom space in the black schools to relieve overcrowding in the white schools. Given that thirteen of the eighteen schools reserved for whites were in racially mixed neighborhoods, it would have been relatively simple to reassign pupils without the additional expense of providing transportation.

Racial segregation was sustained over the next thirty years as the Topeka School Board constantly changed boundary lines ensuring that some its elementary schools remained segregated, and its high schools became more segregated than they were before 1954. In 1955, three former all-black elementary schools were still 100 percent black with only 1 percent of its black children attending elementary schools that were formerly for whites.

From 1931 to 1958, Topeka had one, integrated, senior high school: Topeka Senior High School. Five years after the original Brown decision, when faced with the opportunity to continue the racial parity at the senior high school level that had already existed for more tan twenty years, the Topeka Board of Education made a series of decisions that ensured that racial segregation would be compounded by class.

As city boundaries expanded to the south and west, two more high schools were added: Highland Park Senior High School, acquired through annexation in 1959, and Topeka West Senior High School, opened in 1961. The aging Topeka Senior High now had 83.2 percent of the black students in the Topeka school system assigned to it while was approximately 11 percent black, and Highland Park was 5.1 percent black.

One year later, were now being Topeka High, while Highland Park had 6.5 percent and Topeka West had 0.3 percent. The 1960 U.S. Census data indicates that the largest concentration of Topeka’s black population with school-age children resided midway between Topeka High and Highland Park.

• A simple change in the attendance boundary when Highland Park was annexed would have brought its minority enrollment to 50 percent.
• It would have also alleviated overcrowding at Topeka High, since Highland Park had 497 empty seats.
• Instead, the Topeka School Board elected to build a third high school (Topeka West) at the western fringe of the growing city, assigning to it 2 black children and 702 white children.

Twenty years after Brown, in 1974, the Topeka school system (U.S.D #501) still underutilized predominately black schools while white schools remained overcrowded. For example, there was a 15.1 percent black enrollment at the elementary level, but more than half of them (56.7 percent) were assigned to seven schools, while the nine of the remaining eleven had an average of 4.5 black children assigned to each of them.

Two of those schools, McClure and Potwin, were all-white in 1974. On September 10, 1973, Johnson v. Whittier was filed as a class action brought on behalf of “all Black children who were then or had during the past ten years been students of elementary and junior high schools in East Topeka and North Topeka.” The complaint concentrated more on “equality of facilities than distribution of students, alleging that the children in West Topeka and South Topeka received vastly superior educational facilities and opportunities, including buildings, equipment, libraries and faculties, than could be obtained by students in the areas of East Topeka and North Topeka, which contained higher percentages of minority students.” Though Johnson failed to qualify as a class action suit, it did set off an investigation by the Department of Health, Education and Welfare (HEW) into “the practices of the Topeka public schools regarding race discrimination.” This investigation led HEW to prepare to cut off federal aid to Topeka schools for desegregation noncompliance and to schedule an administrative hearing.

This action also resulted in the filing of U.S.D. #501 v. Weinberger, No.74-160-C5. Though on August 27, 1974, Johnson moved to consolidate with Weinberger, this motion was never decided. The Weinberger case was later dismissed after the Topeka school district’s motion for a preliminary injunction was granted by a U.S.

District court judge, who found that the district court, and not HEW, had jurisdiction over Topeka’s school desegregation. The school board argued that it was in compliance with the original desegregation plan that was approved by the district court on October 28, 1955, and fully implemented by September 1, 1961.

Since the junior high schools were desegregated before Brown in the early 1940s, and the high school was never segregated, they were not considered to be part of the original court order. Additionally, the school board argued that the district court has “exclusive jurisdiction to determine whether or not the Topeka school system is in violation of the Final Order of Judgment and the Court approved plan for desegregation.” The HEW attorney disagreed, stressing, “that while the original plaintiffs in our case were attacking segregation at only the elementary school level, HEW was charged with investigating discrimination in all its aspects at all levels of the public school system.” Meanwhile, two other class action suits related to illegal segregation were filed on August 8, 1979 (Miller v.

Board of Education), and September 7, 1979 (Chapman v. Board of Education). The original Brown case had targeted legal, or de jure, segregation. But it could not address de facto segregation, or the type of segregation that was the “natural” outgrowth of an individual’s choice and their financial resources allowing them to live in any given neighborhood.

In 1979 the Brown case was reactivated. The original lead plaintiff, Linda Brown, now an adult, and other African American parents and their children argued that the Topeka School Board and its successor, U.S.D. #501, had failed to desegregate within the mandates of Brown and Brown II, in which the court in May 1955 ordered that desegregation proceed with “all deliberate speed.” Between September 10, 1973, and September 7, 1979, four separate cases were filed in the federal district court of Kansas raising questions as to whether the Topeka Board of Education and its successor had complied with the mandates of the high court.

Though these cases resulted in minor judgments, they did prompt an investigation by the Office of Civil Rights of the federal Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW). HEW found that Topeka was not in compliance and brought further attention to the ways in which the Topeka Board of Education sought to circumvent desegregation.

The reopening of Brown in 1979 tried to prove that the resegregation of Topeka’s schools was not the “natural” consequence of individual choice, but rather the result of the deliberate actions of U.S.D. #501 to segregate its more affluent citizens (primarily white), who had fled to its western suburbs, from the less affluent (primarily black), concentrated in East Topeka.

• Because the school board had designed and built schools with the effect of limiting access to its newer facilities to only those residing in Topeka’s western suburbs, most African Americans in Topeka were relegated to East Topeka’s rapidly aging and increasingly inferior schools.
• Not only were African Americans geographically bound to attend inferior schools, they were also now economically limited by not having the financial resources to purchase homes that automatically provided them access to newer and better schools.

By the 1970s, Topeka was more spatially and economically segregated than it had been before Brown. There was one important difference: segregation was no longer based on race so much as it was on class, even though being “black” and being “poor” were fast becoming synonymous, not only in Topeka, but in many other American cities as well.

1. The 1970 census showed that in Topeka, Kansas, the mean family income in the wealthy, predominately white West Hills area was triple that of the predominately black southeast area: $19,909 to $6,886.
2. This statistic is also reflected in the 1970 median value of housing, $28,800 in West Hills to $9,550 in East Topeka.

In October 1986 the reactivated Brown was tried in the District Court of the District of Kansas. Six months later the plaintiffs appealed to the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit when the district court decided that there was not enough evidence of purposeful discrimination.

1. On December 11, 1989, the court of appeals voted to reverse the findings of the lower court.
2. The school district appealed to the Supreme Court, but on April 20, 1992, the Supreme Court sent the case back to the court of appeals for further consideration.
3. The appellate court reaffirmed its earlier decision and denied rehearing on January 28, 1993.

A few months later on June 21, 1994, the Supreme Court declined to consider the matter further. Finally, on July 25, 1994, the district court approved the school district’s third desegregation proposal, but the school district continued to be subject to the court’s jurisdiction.

1. Conclusion As the Brown case files demonstrate, by choosing not to distribute the responsibility of desegregation over the entire school system, the Topeka Board of Education, and its successor U.S.D.
2. 501, used its administrative tools in an ongoing manner to actively separate black from white.
3. What is even more disturbing is that after 1954, not only was there continued segregation at the elementary level, but it had also crept into the middle, junior, and senior high grades as well.

Segregation after 1954 was perpetuated not on racial lines but class lines. That class incorporated the race most affected by segregation made it even more pernicious than before Brown. The issues involved in this case are far from resolved. Unlike segregation laws, the social practices that arose to circumvent Brown fifty years ago are much more difficult to overcome.

1. Jean Van Delinder teaches sociology and American studies at Oklahoma State University.
2. Her book on the early civil rights movement, Border Campaigns: A Genealogy of Civil Rights Protest, will be published later this year.
3. Note on Sources Researching the Brown case is complicated because there are really two cases: the famous Supreme Court case called Brown (which was in fact a consolidation of five school desegregation cases including the Topeka, Kansas, case), and the original Topeka case Brown.

In this essay, I focus on the specifics of the Topeka school case and its aftermath using the files housed at the National Archives and Records Administration–Central Plains (Kansas City). The Topeka Brown case files first arrived in Kansas City on September 1, 1967, as part of records center accession 021-68A367.

According to Tim Rives, an archives specialist at NARA–Central Plains, Brown (T-316) had “been removed and placed in the archival depository, not as an actual transfer of custody, but more for safekeeping, to store it in archival quality space.” The Brown files left NARA in the late 1970s and were returned almost twenty years later as an archives accession (meaning permanently transferred from the courts to NARA) on September 27, 1994.

On that date, the court files became available to researchers; however, not all the files were completely returned until the last exhibits were transferred to NARA on August 29, 2000. These records contain a wealth of information about school segregation, desegregation, and resegregation in Topeka, which is a microcosm of what happened nationally in the fifty years since the original Brown decision.

Selected primary sources: William D. Lamson, “Race and Schools in Topeka, Kansas,” March 1, 1985, p.164, Plaintiff’s Exhibit 219, T-316; William Reynolds v. The Board of Education of Topeka of the State of Kansas, Vol.66, p.674, Supreme Court of Kansas, Plaintiff’s Exhibit 23, T-316; “Lowman Hill School: Fight to be brought to a Final Test, Case has been Filed,” Topeka Capital Journal, Friday, February 7, 1902, Box 12, Folder 297, Plaintiff’s Exhibit 297, T-316; Anna Mary Murphy, “Negro Problem in Kansas—Negro Teachers Hit by Desegregation,” Topeka Capital, January 29, 1956, Box 16, #293, Plaintiff’s Exhibit 293, T-316; Johnson v.

Whittier, T-5430, Plaintiffs Exhibit 78, Brown v. Board, T-316; U.S. Bureau of the Census, Department of Commerce, 1970 Census of Population: General Social and Economic Characteristics, PC (1)-C, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1971.

1. Selected secondary sources: Carl T.
2. Rowan, “Jim Crow’s Last Stand: December 1953,” in Reporting Civil Rights, Part One: American Journalism 1941–1963 (New York: Library Classics of the United States, 2003).
3. Richard Kluger, Simple Justice (New York: Vintage Books, 1975).
4. Notes 1 “Interposition” was a doctrine declared unconstitutional before the Civil War, supposedly allowing states to “interpose” their own authority in order “to protect their citizens from unjust actions of the federal government.” It was resurrected to justify continuing school segregation as early as November 1955 in an editorial by James Kilpatrick that appeared in the Richmond News Leader.W.D.

Workman, Jr., “The Deep South,” in Don Shoemaker, ed., “With All Deliberate Speed” (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1957), p.97.2 Oliver Brown et al.v. Board of Education of Topeka, Shawnee County, Kansas, et al.347 U.S.483 (691).3 The U.S. Supreme Court filed a separate opinion on Bolling because the Fourteenth Amendment was not applicable in Washington, D.C.

1. In this case, the Court held that racial segregation in the District of Columbia public schools violated the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment.4 This delay was related to the sudden death of Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson.
2. To fill the vacancy, President Eisenhower nominated John Marshall Harlan in October 1954.

Ironically, Harlan was the grandson of Justice John Marshall Harlan, the lone dissenter in Plessy. In 1896, Harlan wrote the prophetic words in his dissent that “separate but equal” would forever stamp blacks with a badge of inferiority. This same type of argument would prove a decisive factor fifty years later in Brown.5 The following eleven cases reached the Kansas Supreme Court: Board of the City of Ottawa et al.v.

1. Leslie Tinnon (1881); Knox v.
2. Board of Education, Independence (1893); Reynolds v.
3. Board of Education, Topeka (1903); Cartwright v.
4. Board of Education, Coffeyville (1906); Rowles v.
5. Board of Education, Wichita (1907); Williams v.
6. Parsons (1908); Woolridge v.
7. Board of Education of Galena (1916); Thurman-Watts v.

Board of Education of Coffeyville (1924); Wright v. Board of Education, Topeka (1929); Graham v. Board of Education, Topeka (1941); Webb v. School District No.90, South Park Johnson County, Kansas (1949). Articles published in Prologue do not necessarily represent the views of NARA or of any other agency of the United States Government.
View complete answer

Which Supreme Court cases deal with students rights in school?

Many of the rights that students have in school today are the result of students fighting for those rights in the court system. Whenever students have won their cases, they have made it easier for other students to speak up when our rights are violated.

Winning Cases Losing Cases Ingraham v. Wright (Supreme Court, 1977): Two high school students, James Ingraham and Roosevelt Andrews, sued their school alleging they were deprived of their Constitutional rights after being struck with a paddle. The Court concluded that the Eighth Amendment was “inapplicable” in school settings as it has traditionally been used to protect those convicted of crimes, not students. However, Justice White, along with Justices Brennan, Marshall, and Stevens, dissented, noting that the purpose of the Eighth Amendment could be applied to students as it does not expressly mention that it only applies to criminals. The goal of the Eighth Amendment, they argued, is to prohibit punishments deemed inhumane, no matter how grievous the offense committed and therefore, similar punishments cannot be logically imposed on persons guilty of minor infractions, such as breaches of school discipline. Serafin v. School of Excellence in Education (Fifth Circuit, 2007): Jessica Serafin, a high school senior, was hit with a paddle without her consent and sustained a wrist injury due to her attempt to block the paddle. She sued her school for violation of due process rights, but the court found in favor of the school. Winning Cases Losing Cases Tinker v. Des Moines (U.S. Supreme Court, 1969): In 1965, a group of students in Des Moines, Iowa decided to wear black armbands to school in order to protest the war in Vietnam. The principals of the Des Moines schools created a rule prohibiting the wearing of these armbands, threatened suspension if students refused to remove them. Christopher Eckhardt and John and Mary Beth Tinker all wore their armbands to school and were sent home. The students sued the school district for violating their right of expression and sought an injunction to stop the school from issuing punishment. The case ended up at the US Supreme Court who, in a 7-2 decision, decided that the armbands represented a type of speech that protected by the First Amendment. The Court also stated that “it can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate,” and that “In our system, state-operated schools may not be enclaves of totalitarianism. School officials do not possess absolute authority over their students. Students in school, as well as out of school, are “persons” under our Constitution. They are possessed of fundamental rights which the State must respect. ” Bethel School Dist. No.403 v. Fraser (U.S. Supreme Court, 1986): At a school assembly Matthew Fraser nominated a fellow student for elective office with a speech that seemed to be a graphic sexual metaphor. The U.S. Supreme Court found that the school was just with its discipline, because the First Amendment does not prevent schools from prohibiting the type of vulgar and lewd speech that is inconsistent with the course of public school education. Scoville v. Board of Education of Joliet Township (Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, 1970): Two students were expelled for publishing a newspaper that contained editorials critical of the school and the principal and vulgar language. The court condemned the school’s decision as a violation of the students’ First and Fourteenth Amendment rights. Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier (U.S. Supreme Court, 1988): In this precedent-setting case, the Court ruled that schools are able to set certain standards for student speech that is published and disseminated under their sponsorship. Thomas v. Board of Education, Granville Central School Dist. (Second Circuit Court of Appeals, 1979): Students created and published an independent newspaper that school officials deemed “obscene” and punished them for it. The court ruled that the school could not punish student for distributing material off-campus. Morse v. Frederick (U.S. Supreme Court, 2007): During a school trip to watch the Olympic Torch Relay, a high school student displayed a banner saying “Bong Hits 4 Jesus” and was subsequently punished. The court ruled against the student, stating that the speech on the banner was not political in nature, and that its content could reasonably be viewed as promoting illegal drug use. Chandler v. McMinnville School Dist. (Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, 1992): The court decided students cannot be punished for wearing buttons with the word “scab,” even if the word can be considered insulting. Melton v. Corley R. Young et al. ( Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, 1972): A high school student was suspended for wearing an emblem representing a Confederate Flag on the sleeve of his jacket. The Sixth Circuit found that the school principal’s decision was correct as the student’s actions would lead to substantial disorder in the school and thus impede the learning process. Jeglin v. San Jacinto Unified School Dist. (Central District Court of California, 1993): A federal district court in California struck down a prohibition on the wearing of any sports apparel in a junior high school. Broussard v. School Board of the City of Norfolk (Eastern District Court of Virginia, 1992): A student refused to change out of a shirt printed with the words “Drugs Suck!” and was suspended for a day. The court found that the word “suck” was vulgar and that its use in the school was disruptive. Beussink v. Woodland R-IV School Dist. (Eastern District of Missouri, 1998): A high school student was suspended for creating a personal web site on his own computer where he used vulgar language to attack his teachers and school officials. The court ruled that school officials had violated the student’s First Amendment Rights because his speech had not caused a substantial disruption to the school environment. Boucher v. School Board of the School District of Greenfield (Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, 1998): A student published and distributed an independent newspaper with an article giving instructions on how to hack the school’s computers and was subsequently expelled. The court ruled that the school was reasonable in believing that the article would cause a significant disruption. Saxe v. State College Area School Dist. (Third Circuit Court of Appeals, 2001): The court found the the school district’s anti-harassment policy as “unconstitutionally overbroad.” Henerey v. City of St. Charles (Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals, 1999): A student was disqualified from the election for class president as he had passed out condoms to accompany his campaign slogan. The court ruled that the school had a responsibility to maintain decorum and to minimize any threats to its educational mission. Kincaid v. Gibson (Sixth Circuit, 2001): A student editor for the Kentucky State University’s yearbook made various changes to the yearbook, both in content and design. The Vice President of Student Affairs objected to the changes and prevented them. The court ruled that the University administration violated the First Amendment rights of the student editors, because the yearbook was a limited public forum and that the school’s actions were arbitrary and unreasonable. Boroff v. Van Wert City Board of Education (Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, 2000): A high school was allowed to ban t-shirts depicting Marilyn Manson because the court asserted that the school was right in prohibiting clothing that promoted “values that are so patently contrary to the school’s educational mission. ” Sypniewski v. Warren Hills Regional Bd. of Education ( Third Circuit, 2002): The court decided that students cannot be punished for wearing a “You Might be a Redneck If” shirt. Cole v. Oroville Union High School Dist. (Ninth Circuit, 2000): Two students were invited to give graduation speeches. When they submitted the speeches for approval, the principal found the speeches to be proselytizing and sectarian and the students were asked to change them. The court ruled that the principal did not violate the students’ right to freedom of speech, because they limited the speech in the graduation speeches in order to avoid violating the Establishment Clause. Newsom v. Albemarle County School Board (Fourth Circuit, 2003): A student cannot be punished for wearing a shirt that reads “NRA Shooting Sports Camp.” West v. Derby Unified School Dist. (Tenth Circuit.2000): A student was suspended after drawing the confederate flag on a piece of paper despite the school’s recently instituted harassment and intimidation policy. The court upheld the school’s decision, arguing that the student’s actions could have led to a substantial disruption of school discipline. Dean v. Utica Community Schools (Eastern District Court of Michigan, 2004): At Utica High School a student member of the school newspaper published an article about a lawsuit against her school district involving a complaint against the district’s bus garage. The students were told to remove the article due to the ongoing litigation and because the article was based on “unreliable sources” and “highly inaccurate.” The court ruled that the student newspaper was an example of a limited public forum and that the school had censored the article in its own interest, by preventing the expression of its viewpoint, and then claiming it was inaccurate. J.S.v. Bethlehem Area School Dist. (Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, 2002): A middle school student created a website that made derogatory and threatening comments about his teacher and principal, which led to his expulsion. The court ruled in favor of the school and found the comments disruptive and threatening despite occurring off-campus. Guiles Guiles v. Marineau (Second Circuit, 2006): The court defended a student’s right to wear a shirt depicting George W. Bush with the body of a chicken surrounded by oil rigs, dollar signs, cocaine, and alcohol with the words “Chicken-Hawk-In-Chief.” Lassonde v. Pleasanton (Ninth Circuit, 2003): A student that was invited to speak at graduation was asked to remove “overtly proselytizing comments” as they would violate the Establishment Clause. The court found that the school did not violate the student’s rights as the school’s refusal to allow a sectarian speech was necessary to avoid violating the Establishment Clause. Griffith v. Butte School Dist. (Supreme Court of Montana, 2010): When Renee Griffith submitted her graduation speech for approval, she was asked to remove all religious references. When she refused, she was prevented from speaking. The court ruled that Griffith’s speech was the expression of her own views and not that of the school and therefore didn’t violate the Establishment Clause. Hosty v. Carter (Seventh Circuit, 2005): The editor of Governors State University’s student newspaper was told that any subsequent issues would need to be approved by a school administrator, because it had published stories and editorials that were critical of the administration. However, there was already a policy in place that specified that the student newspaper staff could determine the content of their publications without censorship or prior approval. The court ruled against the students, determining that because the newspaper had not previously been established as a public forum like under the Hazelwood standard, and was in fact a nonpublic forum subsidized by public funds then it was open to reasonable regulation. Barnes v. Zaccari (Eleventh Circuit, 2012): A college student used his personal Facebook account to protest a plan to construct a parking garage on campus. The university president began an investigation into the student’s’ academic records, medical history, religion, and registration, and had the student expelled from the University. The court found that the university president was personally liable for the violation of the student’s right to due process. Doninger v. Niehoff (Second Circuit, 2008): Administrators barred a high school student from running in a student election after the student criticized administrators online. The court held that the student’s speech was not protected, because it foreseeably created a risk of substantial disruption within the school environment, and that the school could regulate the off-campus speech given its nexus and link to the actual school environment. B.H. and K.M.v. Easton Area School District (Third Circuit, 2013): The court upheld an injunction preventing the Easton Area School District from enforcing a ban on the popular breast cancer awareness bracelets that said “I heart boobies.” Corder v. Lewis Palmer School Dist. (Tenth Circuit, 2009): A high school student gave a speech, different than the one she submitted, that was full of religious references at her commencement ceremony and was made to apologize. The court ruled that valedictory speeches constitute school-sponsored speech and that a school district is entitled to review the content of these speeches. Burge v. Colton School Dist. (U.S. District Court of Oregon, 2015): A student sent a Facebook messages to his friends, stating that his health teacher needed to be shot. When the messages were reported to the principal, the student was suspended. The student sues and the court concluded that his off-campus Facebook messages were protected because they had not caused a substantial disruption to the school environment. A.M., ex rel. McAllum.v. Cash, (Fifth Circuit, 2009): The court upheld that the school’s ban on the Confederate flag ban was constitutional. Yeasin v. University of Kansas (Court of Appeals of Kansas 2015): A student at the University of Kansas posted several threatening tweets aimed at his former girlfriend, who had a protection order against him and was expelled as a result. The court ruled that the University did not have the jurisdiction to punish Yeasin for his off-campus behavior. Palmer ex rel. Palmer v. Waxahachie Independent School Dist. (Fifth Circuit, 2009): A school was taken to court because it banned all written messages on student clothing, but because the ban was “content-neutral” it was upheld. B.L.v. Mahanoy Area School District (Third Circuit, 2020): The case was filed by a high school student who was kicked off the cheerleading team for cursing the team on Snapchat. The court ruled that students are afforded the same rights as everyone else when they aren’t on school grounds. That means students in Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New Jersey can’t be punished by their schools for off-campus (including online) speech whose means of publication is not officially tied to school. S.J.W. ex rel. Wilson v. Lee’s Summit School Dist. (Eighth Circuit, 2012): Two students created a blog that discussed events at their school. It also contained sexist and racist content and caused a disturbance in the school when it went viral. The court ruled that student speech which disrupts the school environment is not protected by the First Amendment. Wynar v. Douglas County School Dist. (Ninth Circuit, 2013): A high school student was suspended for sending MySpace messages to his friends that mentioned weapons he had in his possession and the students he intended to kill. The court ruled in favor of the school, stating that school officials may restrict speech if they predict that it is likely to cause substantial disruption to school activities. Bradford v. Norwich City School Dist. (Northern District Court of New York, 2014): While at home, a student sent text messages to another student, expressing a desire to harm a third student and was suspended. The court ruled the school had not violated the student’s First Amendment rights and asserted that schools have the right to prohibit speech that can disrupt the work and discipline of the school. Dariano vs. Morgan Hill Unified School Dist. (Ninth Circuit, 2014): On Cinco de Mayo, three students wore clothing to school that depicted the U.S. flag. Upon hearing word that threats of violence were made, the school authorities asked the students to turn their shirts inside-out. The court ruled that the school’s fears that the clothing could incite violence were legitimate. Bell v. Itawamba County School Board (Fifth Circuit, 2015): A high school student created and posted a rap song that criticized two school coaches at for harassing students. The song was composed off-campus and posted online from his home computer, but the student was suspended. The court ruled that the student’s speech would have caused a substantial disruption to the school environment and was not protected by the First Amendment. Keefe v. Adams (Eighth Circuit, 2016): A nursing student at Central Lakes College was expelled for Facebook posts that, according to the college, violated the professional standards students were instructed to follow. The court ruled that the college had the right to hold students to the standards of their intended profession. Winning Cases Losing Cases West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette (Supreme Court, 1943) : West Virginia students Gathie and Marie Barnett were expelled for refusing to recite the Pledge of Allegiance. They, along with other students, sued their schools and the Supreme Court ruled that it is unconstitutional to compel students to salute the flag and recite the Pledge of Allegiance, Frazier v. Winn (Eleventh Circuit Court, 2009) : High school student Cameron Frazier challenged a Florida law that required any student refusing to recite the Pledge of Allegiance to receive parental permission first. The court upheld the law stating that “protecting the rights of parents on some educational issues is sufficient to justify the restriction of some students’ freedom of speech.” Lipp v. Morris (Third Circuit Court, 1978) : High school student Deborah Lipp was told that she had to stand during the Pledge of Allegiance or be punished. She sued her school and the court found that students are allowed to sit down during the Pledge. Holloman v. Harland (Eleventh Circuit Court, 2001) : Michael Holloman sued his school for punishing him for raising his fist during the Pledge of Allegiance, which he did in support of a fellow student that had been forced to apologize for not participating in the Pledge the day before. The court ruled that Michael ” had the constitutional right to raise his fist during the Pledge of Allegiance so long as he did not disrupt the educational process or the class in any real way.” Lane v. Owens (District Court of Colorado, 2003) : Three Colorado students fought a Colorado law that required students to recite the Pledge unless they objected on religious grounds and had parental permission. They successfully won an injunction against the law, which was changed a year later to allow anyone to opt-out. Winning Cases Losing Cases Safford Unified School District v. Redding (US Supreme Court, 2009): An eighth grader at Safford Middle School, was strip-searched by school officials on the basis of a tip by another student that she might have ibuprofen on her person. The Court held that the strip search was not justified nor was the scope of intrusion reasonably related to the circumstances, New Jersey v.T.L.O. (US Supreme Court, 1985) : School officials searched the purse of a high school student on the suspicion that she may have cigarettes. The school then found marijuana, which they reported to the police.T.L.O. was arrested for possession and the Court denied her motion to suppress evidence discovered in the search. Burnham v. West (Eastern District Court of Virginia, 1987) : The odor of marijuana in the hall does not provide reasonable suspicion to search all students’ book bags, purses, and pockets. Vernonia v. Acton (U.S. Supreme Court, 1995 ) The Supreme Court upheld a school district policy which required students to consent to random drug testing as a condition for participation in interscholastic athletics. The Court considered such factors as: the athletes’ relatively low expectation of privacy, the fact that the athletes were leaders in the school’s drug culture, which was “in a state of rebellion”; and that the tests were “directed more narrowly to drug use by athletes,” for whom the risk of harm was “particularly high.” Brooks v. East Chambers Consol. Indep. Sch. Dist. (Fifth Circuit, 1991): A group of students sued their school for engaging in random drug testing of students wishing to participate in extracurricular activities. The court ruled that the school did not have justification for implementing the policy as the drug testing was intrusive and there was no evidence of drug problem or greater safety risk among those subject to the test. Board of Education v. Earls (U.S. Supreme Court, 2002) : The Supreme Court upheld a policy requiring all middle and high school students to consent to a drug test if they wanted to participate in extracurricular activities, This case set the current federal standard, which allows schools broad authority in administering drug tests to their students. A.S.v. State of Florida (Second District Court of Appeals of Florida, 1997) : Four students huddled together, one with money in his hand and another with his hand in his pocket, does not provide reasonable suspicion for a search of pocket contents. Florida v.D.S. (Third District Court of Appeals of Florida, 1996) : The mere presence of a sworn law enforcement officer when a school administrator asks a student to empty his pockets does not trigger the need for probable cause. Willis v. Anderson Comm. Sch. Corp. (Seventh Circuit, 1998) : A school’s policy of drug testing any student who was suspended or violated certain rules was held unconstitutional and that fighting wasn’t enough to evidence to cause reasonable suspicion of substance abuse. Bridgman v. New Trier High School District (Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, 1997) : An experienced drug counselor’s observation of a student who appears distracted and has bloodshot eyes and dilated pupils justifies taking the student’s blood pressure and pulse reading to determine whether he has been using marijuana. B.C.v. Plumas Unified School District (Ninth Circuit, 1999): A school’s policy of using drug-sniffing dogs for random drug searches was deemed unconstitutional intruded upon students’ expectation of privacy. Todd v. Rush County Schools (Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals 1998) : Held constitutional a program prohibiting high school students from participating in purely extracurricular activities unless that student consented to random drug testing conducted by urinalysis. The court claimed that extracurricular activities “require healthy students,” and that participation in extracurricular activities is a “privilege in which students have voluntarily chosen to participate.” Gardner v. Tulia Indep. Sch. Dist. (Northern District Court of Texas, 2000) : The court ruled that the school could not require random drug testing of all students engaged in any extracurricular activities. DesRoches v. Caprio (Eastern District Court of Virginia, 1998) : The fact that the search of all but one student in a class fails to reveal allegedly stolen property gives school officials reasonable suspicion to search that student. Tannahill v. Lockney Indep. Sch. Dist. (Northern District Court of Texas, 2001) : In another case of random drug testing, the court concluded that the school failed to sufficiently demonstrate the need for suspicionless drug testing and recognized the increased expectation of privacy for non-athlete students. Joy v. Penn-Harris-Madison Sch. Corp. (Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals.2000) : The Seventh Circuit upheld the school’s policy requiring students interested in participating in extracurricular activities and student drivers to undergo random drug testing. However, the court made clear in extensive discussion that it believed the drug testing policy violated the Fourth Amendment. It felt bound to uphold the policy only because of the prior Todd case on similar facts in the same court. Klump v. Nazareth Area School District (Eastern District Court of Pennsylvania, 2006) : School officials took a student’s cell phone and a drug-related text came in. The court said that the school could not hold this against him, since there was no justification for a search of the phone, and the search was deemed unreasonable. Brannum v. Overton County School Bd. (Sixth Circuit, 2008) : Video recording middle school age athletes in various stages of undressing in a school locker-room violated the students’ 4th Amendment rights. The school staff were prompted to install video surveillance cameras by a concern that school safety measures should be enhanced. Yet there was no indication that school officials entertained concerns about student safety or security in locker rooms that would reasonably justify installation of cameras there. J.W.v. Desoto County School District, (Northern District Court of Mississippi Delta, 2010) : A student’s phone was confiscated at school and given to police. They claimed it showed pictures of “gang-related activity” and “indecent pictures” – in reality, the photos showed Richard dancing in the bathroom of his home. The court ruled that the school officials could search the phone after confiscating it, but could not discipline him based on what officials found on his phone during the search. S.S.v. Minnewaska Area School District (District Court of Minnesota, 2012) : The school district violated a student’s 4th amendment rights by requiring her to reveal her log-in information so they could search her online communications, none of which occurred during school time or on the school campus, created any type of substantial disruption of the educational environment, or violated any school rule. G.C.v. Owensboro Public Schools (Sixth Circuit, 2013): School administrators were concerned about G.C., a student with drug use, behavior and emotional problems, and suicidal thoughts. A teacher confiscated his phone for violating the no-cell-phone policy, and administrators checked his texts “for his own safety”, but then ended up expelling him from school. The court found that the school officials had no specific reason to believe they would find evidence of further wrongdoing on G.C.’s phone, and therefore the search was unconstitutional. Gallimore v. Henrico County School Board (Eastern District Court of Virginia, 2014) : The court ruled that school could not search a student’s cellphone under suspicion that the student possessed marijuana. (The court did allow for searching the student’s backpack, however.) Winning Cases Losing Cases Widmar v. Vincent (Supreme Court, 1981): Students at the University of Missouri were denied the use of university facilities because their club required denominational prayer and biblical teachings. They sued the university for violating their right to equal access and freedom of religion and speech. The Supreme Court ruled that the University of Missouri did violate the students’ First and Fourteenth Amendment rights because the university al lowed their properties to be used as a public forum and therefore could not pick and choose the content of the speech delivered at such forum. Christian Legal Society Chapter v. Martinez (U.S. Supreme Court, 2010): The Christian Legal Society sued the University of California Law School for a violation of their first amendment rights because the University would not recognize the organization as an official student organization. State law in California required all student organizations to be welcoming to students of all beliefs and backgrounds. The Christian Legal Society required new members to pledge allegiance to the Bible and Jesus Christ which therefore made it exclude members of different faiths and backgrounds. The Court ruled in favor of the public university did not violate the student’s first amendment rights because they followed state laws and were inclusive towards minority students and students of different faiths. Board of Education of Westside Community Schools v. Mergens (U.S. Supreme Court, 1990): When a student Christian based club was denied permission to meet, the school board said it was because they lacked a faculty sponsor. The students believed that the school had violated their rights in the Equal Access Act which required all schools receiving any federal funding to not discriminate against student groups expressive controversial messages such as religion, philosophy or political views. The Supreme Court found since the school permitted other non-curricular clubs, it was prohibited under the Equal Access Act from denying equal access to any after-school club based on the content of its speech. Since religion is not taught in schools, the club was considered not curricular and because it was secular in purpose, it was protected under the equal access act. The non-curricular after school club only required a teacher to be present for safety reasons and the school, which was worried about seeming like it was promoting religion, would not be since the teacher only supervises and does not encourage the messages being taught. The Court ruled in favor of the students and said their right to meet was protected under the Equal Access Act. Rosenberger v. Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia (U.S. Supreme Court, 1995): A group of students at the University of Virginia were denied funding for a student publication due to its religious nature even though it met the funding criteria required of all student groups. While the university claimed that they denied funding in order to not violate the Establishment Clause, the Court found in favor of the students. Boyd County High School GSA v. Board of Education of Boyd County (Eastern District Court of Kentucky, (2003): Students hoping to start a Gay Straight Alliance Club in a Kentucky high school faced many obstacles after their club was initially approved. After many protests against the club, the school suspended all student clubs due to fairness. The student brought a lawsuit against the school arguing that their first amendment rights had been violated. The court ruled in favor of the students because after the school ban, many clubs such as Bible Club and Drama Club had continued to meet on school property. The students had been denied their equal access rights and the court ruled the school must provide facilities for the GSA to meet if they are going to allow other clubs to meet too.

View complete answer

What was the first case of Brown v Board of Education?

Separate But Equal Doctrine – In 1896, the Supreme Court ruled in Plessy v. Ferguson that racially segregated public facilities were legal, so long as the facilities for Black people and whites were equal. The ruling constitutionally sanctioned laws barring African Americans from sharing the same buses, schools and other public facilities as whites—known as “Jim Crow” laws —and established the “separate but equal” doctrine that would stand for the next six decades.

But by the early 1950s, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ( NAACP ) was working hard to challenge segregation laws in public schools, and had filed lawsuits on behalf of plaintiffs in states such as South Carolina, Virginia and Delaware, In the case that would become most famous, a plaintiff named Oliver Brown filed a class-action suit against the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, in 1951, after his daughter, Linda Brown, was denied entrance to Topeka’s all-white elementary schools.

In his lawsuit, Brown claimed that schools for Black children were not equal to the white schools, and that segregation violated the so-called “equal protection clause” of the 14th Amendment, which holds that no state can “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” The case went before the U.S.
View complete answer

Who passed the RTE Act?

Right to Education Act – The Act is completely titled “the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act”, It was passed by the Parliament in August 2009. When the Act came into force in 2010, India became one among 135 countries where education is a fundamental right of every child.

The 86th Constitutional Amendment (2002) inserted Article 21A in the which states:

“The State shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of 6 to 14 years in such manner as the State, may by law determine.”

As per this, the right to education was made a and removed from the list of Directive Principles of State Policy. The RTE is the consequential legislation envisaged under the 86th Amendment. The article incorporates the word “free” in its title. What it means is that no child (other than those admitted by his/her parents in a school not supported by the government) is liable to pay any kind of fee or charges or expenses which may prevent him or her from pursuing and completing elementary education. This Act makes it obligatory on the part of the government to ensure admission, attendance and completion of elementary education by all children falling in the age bracket six to fourteen years. Essentially, this Act ensures free elementary education to all children in the economically weaker sections of society.

A few important articles that a candidate must read to cover the notes on the topic, ‘Education,’ comprehensively are linked below:
View complete answer

Who is the father of Indian education system?

Who is the father of modern legal education in India? Answer at BYJU’S IAS Neelakanta Ramakrishna Madhava Menon is considered by many as the father of modern legal education in India. He was an Indian civil servant, lawyer and legal educator. He is the founder of the National Law Universities system. Further Reading: : Who is the father of modern legal education in India? Answer at BYJU’S IAS
View complete answer

When was Right to Education Act passed?

Right To Education The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act or Right to Education Act (RTE), is an Act of the Parliament of India enacted on 4 August 2009, which describes the modalities of the importance of free and compulsory education for children between 6 and 14 in India under Article 21a of the Indian Constitution.

1. India became one of 135 countries to make education a fundamental right of every child when the Act came into force on 1 April 2010.
2. The Act makes education a fundamental right of every child between the ages of 6 and 14 and specifies minimum norms in elementary schools.
3. It requires all private schools to reserve 25% of seats to children (to be reimbursed by the state as part of the public-private partnership plan).

Kids are admitted in to private schools based on economic status or caste based reservations. It also prohibits all unrecognised schools from practice, and makes provisions for no donation or capitation fees and no interview of the child or parent for admission.

• The Act also provides that no child shall be held back, expelled, or required to pass a board examination until the completion of elementary education.
• There is also a provision for special training of school drop-outs to bring them up to par with students of the same age.
• The RTE Act requires surveys that will monitor all neighbourhoods, identify children requiring education, and set up facilities for providing it.

The World Bank education specialist for India, Sam Carlson, has observed: “The RTE Act is the first legislation in the world that puts the responsibility of ensuring enrolment, attendance and completion on the Government. It is the parents’ responsibility to send the children to schools in the US and other countries.” The Right to Education of persons with disabilities until 18 years of age is laid down under a separate legislation – the Persons with Disabilities Act.

A number of other provisions regarding improvement of school infrastructure, teacher-student ratio and faculty are made in the Act. Education in the Indian constitution is a concurrent issue and both centre and states can legislate on the issue. The Act lays down specific responsibilities for the centre, state and local bodies for its implementation.

The states have been clamouring that they lack financial capacity to deliver education of appropriate standard in all the schools needed for universal education. Thus it was clear that the central government (which collects most of the revenue) will be required to subsidise the states.

A committee set up to study the funds requirement and funding initially estimated that INR 1710 billion or 1.71 trillion (US$38.2 billion) across five years was required to implement the Act, and in April 2010 the central government agreed to sharing the funding for implementing the law in the ratio of 65 to 35 between the centre and the states, and a ratio of 90 to 10 for the north-eastern states.

However, in mid 2010, this figure was upgraded to INR 2310 billion, and the center agreed to raise its share to 68%. There is some confusion on this, with other media reports stating that the centre’s share of the implementation expenses would now be 70%.

1. At that rate, most states may not need to increase their education budgets substantially.
2. A critical development in 2011 has been the decision taken in principle to extend the right to education till Class X (age 16) and into the preschool age range.
3. The CABE committee is in the process of looking into the implications of making these changes.

The Ministry of HRD set up a high-level, 14-member National Advisory Council (NAC) for implementation of the Act. The members included Kiran Karnik, former president of NASSCOM; Krishna Kumar, former director of the NCERT; Mrinal Miri, former vice-chancellor of North-East Hill University; Yogendra Yadav – social scientist.

India Sajit Krishnan Kutty, Secretary of The Educators Assisting Children’s Hopes (TEACH) India; Annie Namala, an activist and head of Centre for Social Equity and Inclusion; and Aboobacker Ahmad, vice-president of Muslim Education Society, Kerala. A report on the status of implementation of the Act was released by the Ministry of Human Resource Development on the one year anniversary of the Act.

The report admits that 8.1 million children in the age group six-14 remain out of school and there’s a shortage of 508,000 teachers country-wide. A shadow report by the RTE Forum representing the leading education networks in the country, however, challenging the findings pointing out that several key legal commitments are falling behind the schedule.

1. The Supreme Court of India has also intervened to demand implementation of the Act in the Northeast.
2. It has also provided the legal basis for ensuring pay parity between teachers in government and government aided schools.
3. Haryana Government has assigned the duties and responsibilities to Block Elementary Education Officers–cum–Block Resource Coordinators (BEEOs-cum-BRCs) for effective implementation and continuous monitoring of implementation of Right to Education Act in the State.

It has been pointed out that the RTE act is not new. Universal adult franchise in the act was opposed since most of the population was illiterate. Article 45 in the Constitution of India was set up as an act: The State shall endeavour to provide, within a period of ten years from the commencement of this Constitution, for free and compulsory education for all children until they complete the age of fourteen years.

As that deadline was about to be passed many decades ago, the education minister at the time, MC Chagla, memorably said: “Our Constitution fathers did not intend that we just set up hovels, put students there, give untrained teachers, give them bad textbooks, no playgrounds, and say, we have complied with Article 45 and primary education is expanding.

They meant that real education should be given to our children between the ages of 6 and 14″ – (MC Chagla, 1964). In the 1990s, the World Bank funded a number of measures to set up schools within easy reach of rural ommunities. This effort was consolidated in the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan model in the 1990s.
View complete answer

Which Supreme Court case in 1973 held that there is no fundamental right to education?

Alan Lomax, photographer. Mexican girls, San Antonio, Texas.1934. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. The 5-4 United States Supreme Court decision in San Antonio ISD v. Rodriguez ( 1973) ruled no constitutional right to an equal education, held no violation of rights in Texas’ school system, and reserved jurisdiction and management of Texas’ public school finance system to the state.

• On July 10, 1968, Demitrio Rodriguez and a group of San Antonio parents filed a class action lawsuit on behalf of minority students from low-income school districts.
• Their attorney, Arthur Gochman, denounced Texas’ inequitable public school finance system, and showed that the Edgewood district, with a predominantly Mexican-American population, and one of the highest tax rates in the Bexar Country, received $37 per pupil, while the more affluent and Anglo students in Alamo Heights got $413 per pupil.

A three-judge federal district court ruled in favor of the plaintiffs finding Texas’ public school finance system discriminatory based on wealth. They argued this inequity was unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. Additionally, they ruled that education is a “fundamental” right.

• The State of Texas appealed the case to the U.S.
• Supreme Court.
• On March 21, 1973, Justice Powell delivered the Supreme Court decision stating that the “Equal Protection Clause does not require absolute equality of precisely equal advantages”.
• Furthermore, the court ruled that the State of Texas had not “deprived” any student access to education, an entity not protected by the 14th Amendment.

They also found no occurring discrimination on the basis of wealth, and retained management of school funding methods to the state and its representatives. In 1984, Rodriguez v. San Antonio ISD (1973) led to another U.S. Supreme Court landmark case: Edgewood Independent School District v.
View complete answer

In which case apex court declared that right to education as fundamental right for children in the age group of 6 to 14 years?

The right to education has also been recognized by the International covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Article 13 – (1) states that,: The states parties to the present covenant recognize the right of everyone to education. They agree that education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and sense of its dignity, and shall strengthen the respect for human right and fundamental freedoms.

Article 13 (2) further provides that the states Parties to the present covenant recognize that, with a view to achieving the full realization of this right: (a) Primary education shall be compulsory and available free to all; (b) Secondary education in its different forms, including technical and vocational secondary education, shall be made generally available and accessible to all by every appropriate means, and in particular by the progressive introduction of free education; (c) Higher education shall be made equally accessible to all, on the basis of capacity, by every appropriate means, and in particular by the progressive introduction of free education; (d) Fundamental education shall be encouraged or intensified as far as possible for those persons who have not received on completed the whole period of their primary education; (e) The development of a system of schools at all levels shall be actively pursued, an adequate fellowship system shall be established, and the material conditions of teaching staff shall be continuously improved.

During the general discussion by the committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights on the right to education (1998), an agreement was reached that four elements define its core content: (1) No one shall be denied a right to education; (2) Everyone is entitled to basic (primary) education in one form or another; this includes basic education for adults.

Primary education must be compulsory and free. No one may withhold a child from primary education. A state has an obligation to protect this right from encroachment by third persons; (3) The minorities have the right to be taught in the language of their choice, in institutions outside the official system of public education.

UNESCO has adopted a number of normative documents, conventions and recommendations ensuring the enjoyment of the right to education for everyone. The best known among these is the Convention against Discrimination in Education, which was adopted on 14th December 1960 by the General Conference and which entered into force in 1962.

The role of international organisation regarding the implementation of the right to education is just not limited to the preparation of documents and conducting conferences and conventions but it also undertakes the operational programmes assuring, access to education of refugees, migrants, minorities, indigenous people, women and the handicaps.

India participated in the drafting of the Declaration and has ratified the covenant; Hence India is under obligation to implement such provisions. The Founder Fathers of the nation recognizing the importance and significance of right to education made it a constitutional goal, and placed it under chapter IV Directive Principle of State Policy of the Constitution of India.

Article 45 of the Constitution requires state to make provisions within 10 years for free and compulsory education for all children until they complete the age of 14 years. Further Article 46 declares that the state shall promote with special care the educational and economic interests of the weaker section of the people.

It is significant to note that among several Articles enshrined under Part IV of the Indian Constitution, Article 45 had been given much importance as education is the basic necessary of the democracy and if the people are denied their right to education then democracy will be paralyzed; and it was, therefore, emphasized that the objective enshrined under Article 45 in Chapter IV of the Constitution should be achieved within ten years of the adoption of the Constitution.

By establishing the obligations of the state the Founder Fathers made it the responsibility of coming governments to formulate a programme in order to achieve the given goals, but unresponsive and sluggish attitude of the government to achieve the objective enshrined under Article 45 belied the hopes and aspirations of the people.

However, the Judiciary showed keen interest in providing free and compulsory education to all the children below the age of fourteen years. In case of Mohini Jain V State of Karnataka, the Supreme Court held that right to education is fundamental right under Article 21 of the Constitution.

1. The right to education springs from right to life.
2. The right to life under Article 21 and the dignity of the individual cannot fully be appreciated without the enjoyment of right to education.
3. The Court observed: # Right to life is compendious expression for all those rights which the Courts must enforce because they are basic to the dignified enjoyment of life.

It extends to the fully range of conduct which the individual is free to pursue. The right to life under Article 21 and the dignity of the individual cannot be assured unless it is accompanied by the right to education. The State Government is under an obligation to provide educational facilities at all levels to its citizens.

1. In case of Unni Krishan V State of Andhra Pradesh the Supreme Court was asked to examine the decision of Mohini Jain’s case.
2. In the present case the Apex Court partly overruled given in the Mohini Jain case.
3. The Court held that, the right to education is implicit in the right to life and personal liberty guaranteed by Article 21 and must be interpreted in the light of the Directive Principle of State Policy contained in Articles 41, 45 and 46.

The Apex Court, however, limited the State obligation to provide educational facilities as follows. (i) Every Citizen of this Country has a right to free education until he completes the age of fourteen years; (ii) Beyond that stage, his right to education is subject to the limits of the economic capacity of the state.

• Further the Supreme Court in M.C.
• Mehta V State of Tamil Nadu the Supreme Court observed that, to develop the full potential of the children they should be prohibited to do hazardous work and education should be made available to them.
• In this regard the Court held that, the government should formulate programme offering job oriented education so that they may get education and the timings be so adjusted so that their employment is should not be affected.

Again in Bandhua Muti Morcha V Union of India, Justice K. Ramaswamy and Justice Sagir Ahmad, observed, illiteracy has many adverse effects in a democracy governed by rule of law. Educated citizens could meaningfully exercise his political rights, discharge social responsibilities satisfactorily and develop sprit of tolerance and reform.

Therefore, education is compulsory., compulsory education is one of the states for stability of democracy, social integration and to eliminate social evils.” The Supreme Court by rightly and harmoniously construing the provision of Part III and IV of the constitution has made right to education a basic fundamental right.

The Government of India by Constitutional (86th Amendment Act) Act, 2002 had added a new Article 21A which provides that “the state shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of 6 to 14 years as the state may, by law determine”.

And further strengthened this Article 21A by adding clause (K) to Article 51-A which provides who is a parent or guardian to provide opportunities for education to his child or ward between the age of 6 and 14 years. On the basis of Constitutional mandate provided in Article 41, 45, 46, 21A and various judgments of Supreme Court the Government of India has taken several steps to eradicate illiteracy, improvement the quality of education and make children back to school who left the school for one or the reasons.

Some of these programmes are National Technology Mission, District Primary Education Programme, and Nutrition Support for Primary Education, National Open School, Mid- Day Meal Scheme, Sarva Siksha Abhiyan and other state specific initiatives. Besides, this several states have enacted legislation to provide free and compulsory primary education such as- the Kerala Education Act 1959, the Punjab Primary Education Act 1960, the Gujarat Compulsory Primary Education Act 1961, U.P.

Basic Education Act 1972, Rajasthan Primary Education Act 1964, etc. However, the Constitution of India and Supreme Court have declared that the education is now a fundamental right of the people of India, but it does not speak about millions of children who are in the age group of 0-5 years. It is needed that the Constitution should again be amended and the children of age group of 0 -5 years should be included; as by the time the child reaches the age of 6 years he/she gets in to the child labour due to the poverty.

Moreover the Constitution only ensures that the state shall provide primary education to the children up to the age of 14 years, and the secondary and higher education is contingent and conditional upon the economic capacity of the state. The right to education will be meaningful only and only if the all the levels education reaches to all the sections of the people otherwise it will fail to achieve the target set out by our Founder Father to make Indian society an egalitarian society.
View complete answer

Which case gave equal protection in the education system?

Activity – As a condition of re-joining the Union after the Civil War, former Confederate states had to ratify what have become known as the “Civil War” Amendments. The Thirteenth Amendment ended slavery; the Fourteenth Amendment granted citizenship to and protected the civil rights of former slaves; and the Fifteenth gave adult black men the right to vote.

1. Unfortunately, the amendments alone proved insufficient to protect African Americans’ rights.
2. Beginning in 1877, laws curbing the civil rights of Blacks began sweeping through Southern state legislatures.
3. These laws became known as “Jim Crow” laws after a black minstrel character.
4. Segregation became a legal requirement and not merely a cultural norm in every Southern state as well as some Northern ones.

In 1896, Homer A. Plessy challenged a Louisiana statue necessitating separate rail cars for black and white passengers. Plessy claimed the law violated the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection clause, which requires that a state must not “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” The Supreme Court disagreed with Plessy’s argument and instead upheld the Louisiana law.

In the process, the Court established the doctrine of “separate but equal.” Though the Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) decision never actually used that famous phrase, the ruling upheld the constitutionality of racially separate public accommodations as long as those accommodations were otherwise equal. The lone dissenting Justice in Plessy, John Harlan, objected to the majority’s decision: “n view of the Constitution, in the eye of the law, there is in this country no superior, dominant, ruling class of citizens.

There is no caste here. Our constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law.” Public schools were able to remain segregated under the Plessy ruling. As public education became more common in the Twentieth Century, the Supreme Court’s “separate but equal” doctrine began to have more of an effect on children.

Black schools and white schools often received disproportionate funding from state and local governments. In Washington DC, lack of new construction caused overcrowding in black schools, while nearby white schools were under-used. In the Twentieth Century, community-based groups paired with the NAACP to conduct targeted legal challenges to the “separate but equal” doctrine.

Their goal was to overturn the “separate but equal” doctrine by building a case that would force the Supreme Court to declare that even if accommodations were “equal” in other ways, segregation itself was unconstitutional. One of the most promising fronts was in the arena of public education.

1. Topeka, Kansas’ school system provided the perfect case because the school buildings, textbooks, materials and teacher salaries were virtually equal in black and white schools.
2. Topeka’s Board of Education operated under an 1879 law, “Schools in Unorganized Counties,” that permitted, but did not require, segregation.

In 1951, thirteen parents sued on behalf of their twenty children. Oliver Brown, father of third-grader Linda Brown, became the named plaintiff. After making its way through the District Courts, the Brown case went to the Supreme Court. In 1954, sixty years after Plessy v.

1. Ferguson, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in Brown v.
2. Board of Education that “separate but equal” was unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
3. The Court cited a series of tests performed by two psychologists, Kenneth and Mamie Clark, demonstrating that segregation had a negative effect on the psyche of black children, instilling in them a sense of inferiority: “To separate from others of similar age and qualifications solely because of their race generates a feeling of inferiority as to their status in the community that may affect their hearts and minds in a way unlikely ever to be undone.” Plessy was officially overturned, as separate accommodations were judges to be “inherently unequal.” Writing for the unanimous Court, Justice Earl Warren stated, “Segregation of children in public schools solely on the basis of race deprives children of the minority group of equal educational opportunities, even though the physical facilities and other ‘tangible’ factors may be equal.

The ‘separate but equal’ doctrine adopted in Plessy v. Ferguson has no place in the field of public education.” After the 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education declared state-mandated segregation in public schools unconstitutional, the case was re-argued to determine how to correct the violations.

In a directive known as Brown II, the Supreme Court ordered District Courts to determine whether local governments were pursuing integration “with all deliberate speed.” Some states and localities began earnest efforts to integrate, while others used the “deliberate speed” provision to delay integration.

In the case of Little Rock Arkansas, integration came only after the President mobilized the National Guard to enforce it.
View complete answer

Which case is related to minority education rights?

Context : The Supreme Court has said that the Govt can regulate the appointment of teachers in minority institutes, it is not a violation of Article 30.4. Differentiating between secular and religious education: To achieve a balance between the twin objectives of ensuring excellence in education and preserving the rights of minorities, the court divided education into two categories – secular education and religious education.

In 2003, an 11 Judge Bench of the Supreme Court decided the question of the scope of the right of minorities to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice under Article 30(1) read with Article 29(2) of the Constitution. It held that only the State can determine the status of a religious or linguistic minority and religious and linguistic minorities, who have been put on a par in Article 30, have to be considered State-wise. The right under Article 30(1) cannot be such as to override the national interest or to prevent the Government from framing regulations on that behalf. Any regulation framed in the national interest must necessarily apply to all educational institutions, whether run by the majority of the minority. Such a limitation must necessarily be read into Article 30. Government regulations cannot destroy the minority character of the institution or make the right to establish and administer a mere illusion. Right under Article 30(1) is not absolute or above other provisions of the law and regulatory measures can be imposed for ensuring educational standards and maintaining excellence thereof especially in professional institutions. It further held that the status of linguistic minority is to be determined in the context of states and not India as a whole. The supremacy of 19(1) (g) : TMA Pai judgment removed the restriction for an individual to start an educational Institution. One is no longer dependent on creating a Charitable Institution to start a Professional College; the rights flow directly from Article 19(1)g.

Article 19(1) (g) in the Constitution Of India states that All citizens shall have the right to practice any profession or to carry on any occupation, trade or business TMA Pai’s judgment was widely criticized for its stand for advocating the rights of Unaided Private Educational Institutions keeping away the Government from implementing social welfare legislations in the field of education.

P.A. Inamdar & Ors. vs. State of Maharashtra case,2005 : The Supreme Court delivered a unanimous judgement by 7 judges declaring that the

State can’t impose its reservation policy on minority and non-minority unaided private colleges, including professional colleges. Up to the level of undergraduate education, the minority unaided educational institutions enjoy total freedom. Graduate and Post Graduate education cannot be imparted by any institution unless recognized by or affiliated with any competent authority created by law, such as a University, Board, Central or State Government or the like.

Pramati Educational & Cultural Trust & Ord. Union of India & Ors case

A five-Judge Constitutional Bench upheld the Constitutional validity of the 93rd amendment to the Constitution of India and RTE Act to the extent that it makes a provision for unaided educational institutions to provide education to economically and socially weaker sections, through 25 % reservation in their educational institutions. The Court, however, excluded minority institutions from the purview of the Act. This was a reaffirmation of the court’s earlier position, pronounced in 2012, in “Society for Unaided Private Schools of Rajasthan versus Union of India and others”. The judgment in effect reduced the rigour of the TMA Pai case regarding the supremacy of 19(1) (g) as interpreted in 11 bench judgment. Minority institutions here refer to both religious and linguistic minorities, as referred to within the Constitution.

1967 Constitution Bench judgment in Azeez Basha The issue :

The question of whether the AMU was established by Muslims was important to decide whether Article 30 (1) of the Constitution applied to it. Once Article 30 (1) applies to an institution, it has the freedom to reserve seats for students belonging to the community it represents.

The judgement : The SC ruled that AMU was not a minority institution because it had been established by an Act of Parliament and had not been set up by Muslims. Subsequently, on the recommendations, Beg committee and Minorities Commission of India, the AMU Act 1920, was amended again in 1981 by the Parliament so as to remove the technicalities which prevented AMU from being declared a minority institution in Azeez Basha.

• The Dr. Naresh Agarwal versus Union of India and Others: Allahabad High Court Judgement Issue: Do Article 30 applies to the AMU and whether it is violative of Article 29 (2) of the Constitution.
• The judgement : The High Court had in January 2006 struck down the provision of the AMU (Amendment) Act, 1981 by which the University was accorded minority status.

Linguistic minorities issue: National Commission for Minority Educational Institutions (NCMEI) Act, 2004 case

The Supreme Court has held that the National Commission for Minority Educational Institutions (NCMEI) has original jurisdiction to determine which institution should be granted minority status. The National Commission for Minorities Educational Institutions (NCMEI) gives the minority status to educational institutions on the basis of six religious communities notified by the Ministry of HRD under the NCMEI Act, 2004 – Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, Zoroastrians (Parsis) and Jains only. Linguistic Minorities do not come under the ambit of the NCMEI Act, 2004.

View complete answer