Education Rights and Classroom-Based Litigation: Shifting the Boundaries of Evidence

SAGE Publications. 2455 Teller Road, Thousand Oaks, CA 91320. Tel: 800-818-7243; Tel: 805-499-9774; Fax: 800-583-2665; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: http://sagepub.com

Y

28

Federal Legislation; State Standards; Academic Standards; Court Litigation; Accountability; School Law; Evidence; Barriers; Educational Policy; Policy Analysis; Access to Education; Student Rights; Equal Education; Classroom Environment; Exit Examinations; Educational Testing; High Stakes Tests; Track System (Education)

Brown v Board of Education; Debra P v Turlington; Equal Access; Goals 2000; No Child Left Behind Act 2001; Rose v Council for Better Education

10.3102/0091732X09349795

0091-732X

The call for American students to meet world-class standards in the federal Goals 2000: Education America Act (1994) and No Child Left Behind legislation, as well as state standards and accountability legislation, has been explicitly inclusive: All students must be held to these high standards. Litigation offers the potential to leverage standards-based accountability laws in ways that refocus attention on opportunities to learn. Moreover, the lens of systemic, classroom-based litigation offers new insights into how evidence can be conceived in ways to advance equity-minded challenges to current policies. In this article, the author examines some fundamental policy issues through a legal lens. The author emphasizes that there are substantial barriers standing in the way of the litigation explored in this article. (Contains 2 figures and 16 notes.)

ERIC

118

2010

EJ883978