An Administrator's Guide to California Private School Law

Chapter 14 – Pupil Records

The California Department of Education, in its implementing regulations, has explained that a “pupil record” means information … maintained within the school system, regardless of the physical form in which it is maintained. Essential in this definition is the idea that any information which is maintained for the purpose of second party review is considered a pupil record. 2064 Information meeting the definition of a pupil record typically may not be released to anyone other than a pupil’s parents. B. C ASE L AW D EFINING P UPIL R ECORDS 1. C ALIFORNIA C ASE L AW California case law regarding the extent to which documents qualify as pupil records is sparse. For the most part, schools must rely on the broad statutory and regulatory language itself. There are few reported California cases addressing the meaning of a “pupil record.” In one case, a newspaper sought access to a legal claim submitted by a family against a school district arising from hazing incidents at a high school. Although the court acknowledged the Education Code’s broad definition of “pupil records,” it determined that the Code did not prevent the release of the claim to the media. The court concluded that “[j]ust because a litigant has chosen to sue a school does not transmogrify the [claim] into [a pupil record].” 2065 In another case, a California Court of Appeal hinted at a somewhat limited definition of “pupil records.” Relying on federal guidance, the court noted that a pupil record does not “encompass every document that relates to a student in any way and is kept by the school in any fashion.” It opined that a typical pupil record “would be registration forms, class schedules, grade transcripts, discipline reports, and the like.” 2066 Similarly, another California Court of Appeal held that “pupil records” did not include medical information transmitted orally to a school. In that case, parents purportedly provided confidential medical information to administrators relating to their son. The parents claimed the school improperly shared the private medical information with a newspaper and brought suit under the California Education Code. Their claim failed. As the court noted, “the [Education Code] governs actual records maintained by the [school] or an employee; it does not pertain to every piece of information conveyed orally to anyone employed or associated with the school or district.” 2067 The California Attorney General has also weighed in on this topic. The Attorney General considered whether a video tape of student misconduct on a bus met the requirements of a pupil record. 2068 The Attorney General concluded that a videotape that captured student images contained information directly related to an identifiable pupil. Therefore, if the school maintained the videotape for disciplinary purposes, for example, it would qualify as a pupil

An Administrator’s Guide to California Private School Law ©2019 Liebert Cassidy Whitmore 498