What is the scope of First Amendment free expression rights of public school employees and students? Following a long period with no Supreme Court rulings pertaining to public employee or student speech, the Court since 2006 has delivered significant opinions in this regard. These decisions continue the trend of narrowing the circumstances under…

This publication is designed to help teachers, nurses and paraprofessionals meet the challenges of dealing with children who have serious medical problems. It contains information on training, health and safety, and legal rights and responsibilities. Specifically, this third edition sets out to accomplish three goals: (1) to educate American…

In May 2006 administrators in the Austin, Texas, Independent School District learned that Tamara Hoover, an art teacher at Austin High School, was the subject of several explicit photographs that had been posted on Flickr, a public photograph-sharing website. Purportedly these photographs were posted on Flickr by the teacher's partner without her…

This plenary address from the AAUP's annual meeting says that it is time to clear away the obfuscating rhetoric and emphasize the urgency of this basic democratic principle. Michael Berube argues that not only is academic freedom under attack, but that what the society is now dealing with is a coordinated program of obfuscation about just what…

The role of collective bargaining in K-12 education invokes sharply different perspectives and debate. Teachers and administrators bring profoundly different points of view to the discussion, creating a division which significantly colors conversations on school reform. School administrators and many educational reformers have generally been…

These proceedings contain the papers of the International Conferences on Educational Technologies (ICEduTech 2014), and Sustainability, Technology and Education (STE 2014). The International Conference on Educational Technologies (ICEduTech 2014) is the scientific conference addressing the real topics as seen by teachers, students, parents and…

In this article, David Schimmel and Matthew Militello document the legal knowledge and training of teachers based on a survey of more than thirteen hundred K-12 respondents in seventeen states. The findings from this study suggest that most educators (1) are uninformed or misinformed about student and teacher rights; (2) have taken no course in…

Educators are generally aware that federal law protects persons with disabilities from unjustified discrimination, but they may not be familiar with the details of how these protections come into play when decisions are made about an individual's educational or employment opportunities. This article focuses on the protections that two federal…

The Commonwealth Teacher Recruitment Protocol (CTRP), adopted by Commonwealth member states in 2004, "aims to balance the rights of teachers to migrate internationally, on a temporary or permanent basis, against the need to protect the integrity of national education systems, and to prevent the exploitation of the scarce human resources of poorer…

Reviews a recent case that exhibits the mistakes that can be made when teachers, school boards, and administrators fail to understand that teacher tenure is not a guarantee of employment but does guarantee that procedural and statutory protections will apply in any termination process. (PGD)

Reviews the Education for All Handicapped Children Act (Public Law 94-142) to assist teachers in understanding their rights and obligations regarding handicapped students. (JOW)

Describes how the University of Arkansas has shown how fast an institution can get off the censure list of the American Association of University Professors. (EV)

St. Bonaventure University fired a tenured professor accused of mistreating athletes and others, but faculty members see it as a flouting of normal procedures by the president. (EV)

Policy discussions about teacher quality and teacher "shortages" often focus on recruitment and retention of young teachers. However, attention has begun to focus on the incentive effects of teacher retirement benefit systems, particularly given their rising costs and the large unfunded liabilities. In this paper we analyze accrual of…

There is significant interest in reforming retirement plans for public school employees, particularly in light of current market conditions. This paper presents an overview of the various types of state regulation of public pension plans that affect possibilities for reform. Several states have legal protections that effectively prevent a state…