Law in Society Competition Hypothetical - 2012
Cyberbullying
Jennifer is a 12-year-old learning disabled student at Richardson Middle School, a public school in Austin County. For the last several years in the Austin County Public Schools system, Jennifer has been taught in classes reserved exclusively for students with learning disabilities. This school year, however, the school system placed Jennifer in a mainstream classroom, in which she is taught alongside students who are not learning disabled. Jennifer is provided with a teacher's aide for one-to-one assistance, and also receives speech therapy services at school.
Since the start of this school year, Jennifer has come home from school almost every day complaining to her parents that her new classmates were bullying her. At first, she was being singled out by her classmates and made the subject of cruel ridicule and teasing about her learning disability. For example, one student posted a crude drawing of Jennifer in the girls’ bathroom, adding a slur about Jennifer’s learning disability. Jennifer complained about the bullying to her teacher, teacher’s aide, and speech therapist. After Jennifer’s teacher instructed the class to stop harassing Jennifer, the bullying continued more subtly. Now, students physically back away from Jennifer when she approaches and refuse to work with her. They decline to talk to her unless forced to in class, and they refuse to touch learning materials that she has touched.
One 11-year-old student, Chris, frequently trips Jennifer when she walks past. He has been disciplined for this, but he continues to trip her, often without being seen by teachers.
All students at Richardson are required to buy a laptop computer from the school for use in connection with their studies. For the last two years, to expand Jennifer’s communications skills, the school system has encouraged Jennifer to use her laptop to blog an online journal about her life. Her journal is never graded, but her teachers review its contents frequently. Her journal invites comments and some of Jennifer’s friends and teachers post notes of encouragement. Lately, however, several anonymous posters have added cruel comments to Jennifer’s blog, mocking her learning disability and language skills. Posters often make jokes about specific instances of bullying that have occurred at school. For example, one anonymous poster often concludes hate-filled posts with the words “have a nice trip tomorrow.”
Jennifer’s teacher noticed this online activity and alerted her principal. At the principal’s request, the school system’s director of technology discovered that some of the posts had been made from computers at Richardson Middle School, while others were made from off campus. Because Jennifer writes in her journal at school and because her teachers review the journal, the school is unwilling to block access to it from school computers. Instead, the principal contacted the parents of Jennifer’s classmates and asked for their support putting a stop to the cyberbullying. They specifically notified Chris’s parents that they suspect he has been making hurtful comments on Jennifer’s blog and asked them to put a stop to it. Chris’s parents refused to do anything, however, thinking that the situation was overblown.
The bullying and harassing blog comments have continued and have intensified. Until this year, Jennifer has been a good student and an enthusiastic participant in class. Now, however, Jennifer no longer wants to go to school and she has told her teacher she wants to stop updating her journal. Jennifer’s grades have fallen substantially, she is showing signs of depression, and she is beginning to make references to harming herself. Jennifer’s parents demand that the school do more to protect her. Specifically, they want the school to tell students in Jennifer’s class to stop making hurtful or harassing comments to Jennifer’s journal from any computer, at home or at school. They also want the school to force Chris to turn over his laptop to the director of technology so that it can be searched to see whether Chris has visited Jennifer’s online journal, and if so, whether the time of those visits matches the time of harassing comments on Jennifer’s blog. Jennifer’s parents have indicated that, if Chris has been involved, they plan on getting the police involved and perhaps even suing Chris or his parents.
Do you think the school should take either of these actions? Is there more that the school legally should be required to do? Do you think the school can be held legally responsible for any of the cyberbullying that has occurred?
If it is proven that Chris has been cyberbullying Jennifer, can his parents be held responsible for his actions?
NOTE: Reference to real persons, places, or events are made in a fictional context, and are not intended to be libelous, defamatory, or in any way factual.
Updated: Nov 07, 2011