Ohio Public School Law: US Supreme Court Cases

Segregation of white and Black children in the public schools of a state solely on the basis of race, pursuant to state laws permitting or requiring such segregation, denies to Black children the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment.

A school district does not violate the 4th Amendment when it requires drug tests to participate in extracurricular activities.

Title IX can be enforced through a private cause of action.

Requires a pretermination hearing as a matter of constitutional due process for the discharge of a public employee.

The Supreme Court held that a public school may not force an official prayer on schoolchildren.

The sexual harassment of students by either school district employees or other students is actionable under Title IX.

FERPA provisions create no personal rights to enforce under § 1983

The US Supreme Court stated that a school board lacks authority to ban library books just because they contain ideas that school board members find repugnant.

School board did not have the right to fire a coach for leading a prayer on the football field.

School officials need not obtain a warrant before conducting a search, nor must they have "probable cause." However, the search must be reasonable.

A Texas statute which withholds from local school districts any state funds for the education of children who were not "legally admitted" into the United States, and which authorizes local school districts to deny enrollment to such children, violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Because the suspected facts did not indicate the drugs presented a danger to students or were specifically concealed in the student's underwear, the principal did not have sufficient suspicion to warrant extending the search to the student's underwear.

Held that the Gun Free Schools Act was unconstitutional because it regulated actions that did not involve interstate commerce. The Act was modified to make clear that it would only prosecute gun crimes in schools that involved interstate commerce.

Under the Free Exercise of Religion Clause of the First Amendment, a state law requiring that children attend high school violates the parents' constitutional right to direct the religious upbringing of their children.

Ohio's program that gave parents tuition vouchers that allow their children to attend a private or religious school was constitutional, since the vouchers do not promote religious schools alone.

Allows release time from public school for religious instruction.