Foster teen gets wish granted

A 17-year-old Legal Aid client  in foster care got her wish yesterday–the surprise present of a laptop computer for the aspiring visual artist and photographer to do her school work on. Adrienne St. Paul, who enters her senior year in high school this fall, is the first recipient of a computer from F.O.S.T.E.R.–Friends of Special Teaching and Educational Resources, a Frederick group collecting new laptop computers and digital cameras for children in foster care, the Frederick News-Post reported today.

“Ten weeks ago, St. Paul’s Legal Aid lawyer, Kathleen Hughes, told [Master Rick] Sandy the high school student needed a computer to do schoolwork,” the article said. “Working on library computers wasn’t always possible. Sandy called Hughes to the bench and ordered the formation of a committee to find funding for laptops.”

“We’re making history here today,” Sandy said to applause , and a few tears [in his courtroom yesterday], about the gathering, which was sprinkled with [judges], lawyers and social workings all in on the surprise.”

To read the article, click here.

Multi-service center for poor to expand in Howard

A center for helping low-income residents of Howard County will expand this summer, the Howard County Times reported yesterday. The North Laurel-Savage Multi-Service Center, which provides a wide range of human service programs, will nearly double the number of clients served when it relocates in July. Maryland Legal Aid is one of the programs that helped about 1,900 families and individuals at the center last year.  “The idea is ‘one-stop shopping’ to streamline services to reduce the number of contacts and visits to various service providers,” said Denise McCain, Legal Aid’s director of program development and compliance.  “The average client has more than one issue and generally needs a multitude of services.” To read the article, click here.

“Children make mistakes”–and they shouldn’t be permanently expelled from school

The Baltimore Sun ran a letter from Maryland Legal Aid’s Cornelia Bright Gordon about Baltimore City school’s permanent expulsion policy.  “Children make mistakes,” wrote Bright Gordon, co-chief attorney of Legal Aid’s Baltimore office. “Which of them shall we throw away without benefit of any public education that might be their life-line for future success? No person attains adulthood without regrettable conduct.

“Our societal plan is to teach a child correct behavior, to help him/her learn from mistakes, and become a valuable, contributing member of our community upon adulthood,” she continued.

“Maryland law provides a free public education to all children ages five to 20. Certainly the law authorizes the individual counties to create discipline policies. But it anticipates a specific time period of removal from the child’s current school, and not an indefinite exclusion from all school whatsoever.”

To read the entire letter, click here.

Social workers join Legal Aid

Getting social work support for Maryland Legal Aid clients in Baltimore  has been a priority for at least 10 years–and this fall, it became a reality: Four University of Maryland School of  Social Work graduate students–candidates for  master’s degrees–began working in the Administrative Law Unit of Legal Aid in September under the supervision of  Liz Pickus LCSW-C, a professor at the UM School of Social Work.

“This is the first time the School of Social Work has placed students in a law firm, and so it is an experiment,” said chief attorney Cornelia Bright Gordon. “Our staff have requested assistance with home visits, photography of housing conditions, application assistance of all sorts, landlord negotiation, medical appointment and case worker coverage, and much, much more. The social workers will be supporting the entire Baltimore City general practice, including, and especially, at intake.”

Baltimore schools challenged over permanent expulsions

Legal Aid staff attorney Nicole Jassie

After Maryland Legal Aid successfully challenged the permanent expulsion of three Baltimore City school students, the Baltimore Sun reports that the school system is softening its stance on permanent expulsion for students under 16 involved with arson or explosives.

“Nicole Jassie, a Legal Aid attorney, said she believes the Baltimore school system may have violated the Maryland Constitution when it told students they no longer had access to a public education,” said today’s article, “Debate simmers over student expulsions.” “She points out that the state guarantees chidren a free and adequate education and makes school attendance mandatory up to the age of 16.”

Jassie also pointed out that the policy contrasts with the criminal justice system. “Even teenagers who are convicted of serious crimes are allowed to go to a jail school,” the article said. “While a few school systems don’t let a very small percentage of students back in their schools after serious incidents, most systems transfer students to alternative schools and then allow them to return.”

To read the entire article, click here.

Last week, Assistant Director of Advocacy for Children’s Rights Janet Hartge and Jassie appeared on the Marc Steiner Show on WEAA-FM. Hartge debated Baltimore City schools’ Jonathan Brice about its permanent expulsion policy.

MTA extends evening bus hours for students

The Maryland Transportation Authority has extended the expiration time of student bus tickets from 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. so that more students can participate in after-school activities. The extension is the result of efforts by Maryland Legal Aid’s Youth Achieving Potential Project, a coalition of student activists, the Baltimore Algebra Project and City Councilwoman Mary Pat Clarke.

“We were successful in persuading Paul Wiedefeld, the director of the MTA, to extend the time as a pilot project for the months of April and May,” said Michelle Kurta, a Maryland Legal Aid paralegal who works in the project. “Last week the Mr. Wiedefeld announced that the extension has been successful and that he will expand the pilot into policy for the 2009-10 school year. This is a wonderful student-led victory and was a great experience for the young advocates in YAPP’s Youth Council.” For more information, call Kurta at 443/451-2812.

Permanent expulsions a tough lesson in city schools

Baltimore’s Fox 45 TV news interviewed Maryland Legal Aid staff attorney Sarah Morgan and one of her clients, whose 13-year-old daughter was permanently expelled from the city’s school system after she was accused of setting a fire in bathroom. “We think this is an extreme overreaction to the school safety problem,” Morgan told Fox 45’s Jeff Abell. “We understand it’s a serious problem that needs to be addressed. But this is zero-tolerance taken to a real extreme.” Click on the photo to see the video.

In Baltimore City, expulsions are forever

Maryland Legal Aid staff attorney Sarah Morgan

Students in Baltimore City caught committing arson or detonating explosives are being permanently expelled from city schools. While they may appeal, the Baltimore Sun reported today, if the expulsions are upheld, they are never to return to city schools.

Some parents of the expelled students are represented by Maryland Legal Aid. “The assumption is that when a kid is expelled, they get sent to an alternative school,” said staff attorney Sarah Morgan. “The school system is saying you lose your right to an education if you do certain things.”

Morgan represents two 13-year eighth-graders accused of setting trash can fires. She neither had a prior record of discipline problems. To read the article, click here.

Getting to school in Baltimore: A big hassle

WEAA-FM interviewed assistant director of advocacy Jessica Rae for a news feature about the difficulties Baltimore City students face getting to school. Not Present or Accounted For: The Attendance Crisis in Baltimore Schools also included interviews with several children in the Youth Achieving Potential program directed by Rae.

“What we find when we speak to the young people we work with, one of the biggest issues they’re worried about is education and access to school,” Jessica said in her interview. “When we talk about why they can’t get to school, they talk about buses driving past them, or not picking them up. They talk about what a hassle it is to get to school. They talk about being tired in school and unsuccessful, and obviously that’s a barrier that we would like to remove.”

Legal Aid helps students enroll in Cecil Co. schools

The problem: For two years, the Northeastern Maryland office (in Bel Air, covering Harford and Cecil counties) has had clients calling because the frontline personnel at Cecil County public schools continue to tell grandmothers (or other relatives) that they must have custody of the child in order to enroll the child in the grandmother’s school district.

The solution: Assistant Director of Advocacy Jessica Rae did extensive research on the kinship care requirement for each county and distributed it to 13 Legal Aid offices around the state. “Armed with that information and the necessary one-page form, I have advised people that the school is wrong,” said Northeastern Maryland office chief attorney Jeanette Cole. “When I have given them the correct information and sent them back to the school, they have always successfully enrolled the child.”

Yet in spite of this the procedure was continuing in some of the schools. In an effort to try to bring this to the attention of the Cecil County Board of Education, Rae drafted a very complete letter (with a footnote, no less) explaining the kinship care requirements.

“It was a great letter,” Cole said. “I sent it to the acting superintendent of schools and he forwarded it to the appropriate associate superintendent who immediately called me. We had a great discussion.” The associate superintendent thanked Cole for the letter and emphasized that they try to be sure that the front desk employees are not giving incorrect information, but it is hard to check on each one. She said that the letter had given her an opportunity to remind supervisors of the kinship care requirements. She also asked that if the Northeastern Maryland office finds any other people who have been told that they have to get custody, to identify the school and call the her immediately–and it will be corrected.

“She was very appreciative of our input and emphasized that I should call her at any time with questions or concerns for students of Cecil County Public Schools,” Cole said. “Thanks to the letter Jess drafted, I believe we helped others from going through the hassle of filing for custody when a one-page notarized statement does the trick!”