David Schimmel

Toward Universal Legal Literacy in American Schools.

Abstract This article examines how preservice and in-service teachers can be prepared to understand and implement school law. First, we report on research findings about what teachers know, do not know, and want to know about education law and where they get their information. Second, we identify the current norms, practices, and implications of preservice and in-service teacher education concerning school law. Finally, we offer alternative approaches to achieve universal legal literacy and its beneficial implications for teachers.

No Longer Second Class Citizens.

It has been a long held belief in our country that teaching is a privilege and not a right. Consequently, people who sought this privilege were commonly expected to surrender ordinary constitutional rights. This belief derived from an old dictum of Justice Oliver W. Holmes, Jr., to the effect that a person had a right to be a policeman or to engage in politics but not both. Even in recent years high educational officials have said that if a person enters teaching he must give up rights his local community wants him to surrender. We conclude, however, that people holding these views are mistaken and that the right versus privilege doctrine can no longer be uncritically applied. On the other hand, it would be an oversimplification to state that the civil rights of teachers were identical to those of business