Do Immigrants have a right to an education? Apparently so. A recent ruling by the United States Justice Department against the Collier County, Florida Public Schools has been referred to a Federal Judge. Apparently the district has refused to enroll a number of immigrant children. According to the justice department English Learner students must have equal access to a high quality education. The students involved have alleged that they were denied admission to schools because of their place of birth and were directed to a non-credit language program at their own cost. Attorneys for the Southern Poverty Law Center filed a lawsuit again the district.
As far back as 2014 The US Department of Education has been dealing with the issues of unaccompanied minor student coming to the US from South America.
According to the lawsuit “ at least 369 foreign-born students between the ages of 15 and 18 were funneled to Collier County Adult English Language programs instead of a regular public school…” The district used as a screen the age of the students to reject those who would not be able to graduate before their 19th birthday.
The underlying federal laws cited included both the Equal Education Opportunities Act (1974) and Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, representing the plaintiffs has argued that school are obligated under federal law to help students with language limitations.
“The practice of excluding national original minority (English Learning) children from high school and warehousing them in a non-credit adult language program is the opposite of attempting to overcome language barriers.”
c.2016 J. Margolis
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