All too often, it feels like the cards are stacked against the decks held by students with disabilities and their families. It can be undeniably tough to secure accommodations for students with disabilities, to have those accommodations enforced and to otherwise protect them from discrimination in educational settings.
Thankfully, though, there are times when these students and their loved ones – and society as a whole by extension – secure meaningful victories. At the end of its 2024-2025 term, the United States Supreme Court handed the cause of equal opportunity in education its first significant win in some time.
A.J.T. vs. Osseo Area Schools
The decision at issue was handed down in a case known as A.J.T. vs. Osseo Area Schools. Essentially, there had traditionally been two standards of legal review at play in different parts of the country when it came to lawsuits concerning disability discrimination in education. One standard was easier to meet. One standard was harder. Whether a particular student with disabilities and their family needed to meet the easier or more stringent burden was dependent upon where they lived and filed their legal claims.
When the plaintiff in the A.J.T. case had originally filed suit, the lower court that heard the case subjected the student’s claim to the harsher standard of review. This meant that it was going to be tougher for them to hold their school to account for discriminatory treatment under federal law than it would have been had they been subject to the more lenient legal standard.
The United States Supreme Court – unanimously, no less – sided with the student in this case on appeal. It ruled that “ADA and Rehabilitation Act claims based on educational services should be subject to the same standards that apply in other disability discrimination contexts,” not a “distinct, more demanding analysis.”
This is a particularly sweet victory for students and families living in judicial districts wherein the harsher standard of “bad faith or gross misjudgment” has been applied in such cases. It is also a victory for every student with disabilities nationwide, as it represents an acknowledgement that their right to protection against discriminatory treatment is worthy of respect.