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Schools’ Duty of Reasonable Supervision of Children upon Dismissal- Jenkins v. Anderson

September 2007

Robert Schwartz, Esq.By: Robert Schwartz, Esq., Chief Legal Counsel

On June 14, 2007 the New Jersey Supreme Court unanimously held that schools have a duty to "exercise reasonable care" when supervising students at the time of a school’s dismissal. The court said that this duty requires a school district to adopt a reasonable dismissal supervision policy, provide adequate notice of that policy to parents and guardians and comply with parents’ reasonable requests pertaining to the dismissal of their children.  

The plaintiff, Joseph Jerkins, was a 9-year old student in the Pleasantville School District who was struck by a car after having left school unattended earlier in the day. The accident caused him to be paralyzed from the neck down. Among the issues before the court was whether the school district had a duty of care, and if so, what was its scope, and whether the district had breached its duty.

FACTS

Joseph was a third grade student at the South Main Street Elementary School. According to the decision, the school was located on a busy thoroughfare. Pleasantville is a walking district with no bus service. The student was said to regularly walk to and from school with his older brother or other family members or a babysitter.

On the day of the accident, June 15, 2001, Joseph's older brother had walked him to school. He later testified that he was unaware that this was an early dismissal day. As a result, when school was dismissed at about 1:30 Joseph left unsupervised and went to play with some friends. Later, Joseph was struck by a car at an intersection several blocks from school and in a different direction from his home.

While the school district had a policy entitled “Pupil Safety,” which included a section pertaining to supervision of students at dismissal time, it was general in nature. It stated that "the Chief School Administrator was to seek the cooperation of parents/guardians to prevent children from being unsupervised on school property during lunch hour and during morning arrival and afternoon dismissal times." It did not outline how supervision of dismissal was to be administered.

The South Main Street Elementary School adhered to a “practice” that all school personnel supervised dismissal. Teachers escorted students from their classrooms to designated exits, where they remained to ensure that the children left the school premises. If a parent had notified the school that their child was not to walk home unattended, and the child was not picked up by a family member or another designated individual, school officials contacted the guardian. If they were unable to reach the guardian the child was allowed to remain in the after school program.

Joseph was not registered in the after school program, and as his parents had not requested that he be released to the custody of an adult upon dismissal from school, he was not restricted from leaving unsupervised.

The June 15 early dismissal day had been announced by the school. It had been placed in the school handbook, which included the district’s annual calendar, and had been given to all students at the start of the school year. Though Joseph had registered in October, one month after school had begun, the principal stated that all students who registered after the beginning of the school year received a handbook as part of their registration process. Joseph’s father acknowledged that he had received the registration packet, but he did not remember receiving the school handbook. While the handbook contained a form to be signed and returned by the student’s parent or guardian confirming receipt, the school had discarded the forms at the end of the academic year. Therefore, the school could not confirm whether the handbook had been given to Joseph’s father.

In addition, the June 15 early dismissal had been included in the annual calendar given to parents at back to school night. The annual calendar had also been distributed to students for them to bring home. Also, the June schedule was included in the June newsletter mailed to all Pleasantville households, provided to every student at school and made available in the school’s front office. Near the end of the academic year, the school had also sent home a reminder notice with each student that reiterated the early dismissal dates for the month of June. 

While Joseph’s father acknowledged receiving documentation from the school during the school year, he did not recall whether he received a school newsletter, an annual calendar, a monthly calendar or the reminder notice. In fact, Joseph’s family members asserted that they were not made aware of the early dismissal days, including June 15, through any school communication.

As it turned out, in addition to the early dismissal of June 15, Joseph had come home early without supervision on June 14, and had advised his father that there had been a half day at school that day. His father had not called the principal or anyone at school to complain about Joseph having left school unsupervised on June 14.

DUTY OF CARE ANALYSIS

To determine whether a duty of care existed, as well as the scope of that duty, the court first considered the foreseeability of harm, and then analyzed “whether accepted fairness and policy considerations support the imposition of the duty.”

As to the issue of foreseeability of harm, the court said that children "face many foreseeable dangers,” including "numerous risks… when leaving school property." The court said that younger children have even greater risks because they are "less able and less likely to discern danger.”

With respect to fairness and policy considerations, the court identified four factors:

  • the relationship of the parties
  • the nature of the attendant risk
  • the opportunity and ability to exercise care
  • the public interest in the proposed solution

Relationship of the parties

The court said that parents entrust their children to the care of schools and therefore educators "have no greater obligation than to protect the children in their charge from foreseeable dangers, whether those dangerous arise from careless acts or intentional transgressions of others.” Accordingly, the court said that school officials have a general duty to exercise “reasonable supervisory care" for the safety of students and are "accountable" if injuries result from a "failure to properly discharge that duty." The court found that this duty of care extends throughout the school day "including dismissal time." 

Nature of the attendant the risks posed to students

The court said that children, particularly younger children, have a known "proclivity to act impulsively without thought of the possibilities of danger and it is precisely that lack of mature judgment which makes supervision so vital.” 

A school’s opportunity and ability to exercise care

The court said that as school officials are required to exercise reasonable care in supervising students during the school day, that same duty applies to the dismissal process.

The public interest

The court said that it would not be adequately served if “the duty of care during school hours arbitrarily ceases when the school bell rings. On the contrary, because it is consistent with the … recognized goal of ensuring students’ safety during school hours, public policy strongly supports the school’s duty to ensure reasonable supervision of students at dismissal.”

In concluding that schools have a duty to exercise reasonable care at the time of dismissal the court laid out three (3) elements that schools must be met. A school district must:

  • Adopt a reasonable policy concerning dismissal, and the manner in which students of different ages are to be dismissed. The policy must, at a minimum, include sufficient detail about the adult supervision and patrols present during dismissal, the assigned duties and locations of those adults and procedures for early dismissal days.
  • Provide adequate notice of the adopted dismissal policy to all parents or guardians. The policy must specifically inform parents of the school calendar and typical dismissal protocol, including the supervision that will be provided at the end of the school day, and of the available supervised after school services along with enrollment information. As for the students who walk to and from school, the court said that schools must have a mechanism by which parents who do not want their children to walk home unescorted can make their wishes known to appropriate district personnel.
  • Effectively implement the dismissal policy and adhere to parents’ reasonable requests regarding the dismissal of children. “If instructed not to permit a child to walk home alone, a district must retain supervision over the child while the student remains on school property awaiting the arrival of the appropriate escort or designated transportation. The district must have a plan for emergencies such that, when unforeseen events prevent a parent or designated escort from arriving for the child at dismissal, the child will be provided some form of temporary, supervised shelter."

CONCLUSION

The court did not decide the issue as to whether the Pleasantville School District breached its duty of care. Finding the record to be inadequate it remanded the case to the trial court and left that issue to be decided by a jury. But the court left no doubt that a school has a duty of care to its students at the time of dismissal, just as it has a duty of care during the school day. The import of the decision is that the duty of care requires schools to have adequate policies, which are to be complied with, and which must be properly advertised to parents and guardians. That said, the court also recognized that "schools are [not] guarantors of students' safety with respect to all activities during or after dismissal." While schools must adopt policies that outline what parents and guardians may expect at dismissal, parents and guardians also have a responsibility to "read and heed school notices, advise school authorities of changed conditions. [and] act reasonably and responsively in dropping off and picking up [their] children."