A Stitch in Time Saves Nine: How the State of Ohio Can Save Money and Distress Through Legal Training for Pre-Service Teachers

For simplicity, this Note will focus on the educational requirements for high school teachers rather than elementary or middle school teachers. Here, the requirements include core content instruction, literacy instruction, and a 12-week student teaching experience. Additionally, ODHE issues a vague requirement of preparation in six different Ohio school-related standards. Only one of those standards, the Ohio Standards for the Teaching Profession, even mentions correctly applying the law. There is clearly a need for some form of legal preparation for teachers in Ohio that must take place before an individual becomes a teacher. Not only is there an ethical obligation to protect student rights, but there is a financial obligation to prevent the waste of taxpayer money on legal fees. This Note will establish the need for the Ohio legislature or ODHE to require that teacher preparation programs contain a set number of hours devoted to instructing pre-service teachers in the basics of education law and ethics because of the liability being placed on school districts. In reaching its conclusion, Part I of this Note discusses the history of education and education standards in Ohio and how the law is omnipresent in a teacher’s day-to-day existence. In Part II, this Note covers the history of claims, the potential for school district liability for failing to train teachers and school personnel, and the ways school districts are immune from suits. In Part III, this Note sets out how more legal education could be added to the basic educational curriculum for pre-service teachers and explains why this move is both necessary and advantageous. The overall conclusion reached by this paper is that, while the state is immune from lawsuits due to a failure to train teachers, continual legal pressure on school districts could increase the support for legal training for teaching education law in universities to pre-service teachers