An Administrator's Guide to California Private School Law

Chapter 13 - Student Applications And Enrollment Contracts

information regarding student tuition payments that includes a schedule of tuition and fees due for the upcoming school year, tuition payment plans, tuition refund plans, tuition payment policies, any enrollment deposit, and the consequences of a failure to timely pay tuition. These sections of enrollment contracts should contain information relating to late fees that may be assessed for late payments and provisions preventing students from attending classes or other school activities if their parents fail to make timely payments. The enrollment contract should also clearly set forth that the parents/guardians have an individual and joint obligation to pay all tuition and fees due under the contract, and that this obligation is unconditional and applies whether or not the student starts or completes the school year. 2. C ANCELLATION A ND W ITHDRAWAL P OLICIES Enrollment contracts typically contain provisions stating that if a student voluntarily withdrawals from school after a certain date, usually prior to the beginning of classes for a school year, the enrollment deposit, tuition deposit, and/or entire annual tuition, may be non-refundable. Contracts should also contain provisions addressing refunds of tuition in the event a student withdraws from the school during the school year, whether the withdrawal is voluntary, involuntary, or encouraged. We recommend including language informing parents that the school makes expenditure commitments to vendors, teachers, and staff based on its anticipated enrollment, and that students who leave the school after a certain date are not entitled to a refund because the school has already made irreversible financial commitments based upon that tuition being available for the entire school year. 3. C ONSEQUENCES OF F AILURE TO T IMELY P AY T UITION Enrollment contracts may include language providing parents and students with notice of what will happen if tuition is not paid in a timely manner, or not paid at all. Parents who agree to and sign the enrollment contract will be bound by those terms. If an enrollment contract states consequences for failure to pay tuition, it should clearly list the specific consequences and state that the school has the discretion to determine which consequences will apply. A possible consequence for failure to timely pay tuition could include preventing a student from sitting for final examinations, which would preclude the student from finishing the courses and receiving grades for those courses. Another consequence could be not providing a letter of recommendation for the student’s application to a secondary school or college/university. Other possible consequences include not allowing the student to advance to the next grade level upon reenrollment until all tuition is paid or taking away privileges such as attending school social events. Schools should not withhold any official pupil records as a consequence of non-payment or an untimely payment. Parents and guardians have an absolute right to access any and all pupil records related to their children under the Education Code. 2013 There are some narrow exceptions for when a school can withhold a pupil record, but those exceptions relate to when a student has willfully damaged school property. In that case, a school can withhold pupil records until the damages are paid.

An Administrator’s Guide to California Private School Law ©2019 Liebert Cassidy Whitmore 483