In a California case involving a 16-year-old girl's possession of three knives on school grounds, both a trial and Ninth Circuit court affirmed the school vice-principal's right to search and discover these weapons while enforcing a no-smoking policy. The court lectured parents and lawyers for wasting the court's time--especially after a juvenile…

This analysis of a November 2001 case in Botetourt County, Virginia, looks at whether the Fourth Amendment right against an unreasonable "seizure" or the 14th Amendment "liberty" for parents to control the care and custody of their children requires a ban on, or at least immediate notification regarding, detentions of a…

Many view the problem of violence as not merely a school problem, but as a much larger community problem that is finding its way into the schools. As a society, in addition to teaching our children how to be violent, we are giving them the tools of violence. There are steps that school board members can take to establish and maintain control of…