Pepper Hamilton Represents Refugee Students in Civil Rights Lawsuit
Pepper Hamilton, the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania, and the Education Law Center represented six student refugees in a civil rights lawsuit against the School District of Lancaster, PA (SDOL) after the students were denied enrollment into the SDOL's program for international students. The suit alleged that the SDOL had a practice of delaying and denying enrollment of older immigrant and refugee students or sending them to an alternative school for accelerated credit acquisition, and sought a preliminary injunction to get them placed in the District's regular high school, which has a program specifically designed for newly entering refugee students.
After a five-day preliminary injunction hearing, U.S. District Judge Edward G. Smith of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania ruled that the SDOL violated the civil rights of older immigrant students with limited English proficiency when it diverted them to an inferior, alternative school that taught an accelerated program in a language the students did not understand rather than allowing them to attend the District's regular high school.
Judge Smith ordered the SDOL to immediately transfer the students to the district's regular high school, the International School at McCaskey, in time for the beginning of the school year on Tuesday, August 30, 2016.
"This was truly a gratifying result to see our clients get to enroll in a program that will enable them to learn English and get a meaningful education – the program where they belonged in the first place," says Pepper Hamilton of counsel Kathleen A. Mullen. "It was a result made possible after several weeks of outstanding effort by a dedicated team."
The Pepper team was led by partner Eric Rothschild and of counsel Kathleen A. Mullen and included associates Megan Morley, Katrina M. Long, Kaitlin M. Gurney and Hedya Aryani, and paralegal Lacey Selman.
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