The Legal Ledger

This has been another active week in the world of school law. Please see below for a quick recap of some of the noteworthy school law news that occurred this week.

For reasons that are evident to everyone, there has been renewed focus on whether and when vaccinations can be required. For the most part, the case law on vaccines is older law; the important vaccination cases in the United States court system are typically from the early part of the 20th century.  However, a case did surface out of New York during 2020 and the plaintiffs are trying mightily to get it into the Supreme Court of the United States. The case involved routine childhood vaccinations, but it is a good preview of how COVID vaccine challenges may fare in the courts. 

Late on Friday, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Department of Education (USDOE) release updated guidance to support school districts as they continue the return to in-person instruction.

On Feb. 2, the Ohio Department of Health (ODH) released updated guidance on the K-12 School Staff Vaccination Program. The new guidance includes an updated K-12 school vaccination timeline as well as more specific definitions as to which K-12 personnel are eligible for the vaccinations.

More specifically, ODH states the following in the new guidelines:

On Jan.

On Jan. 7, 2021, the Department of Labor (DOL) published its final rules for determining whether a worker is an independent contractor or an employee for purposes of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). The rules take effect on Mar. 8, 2021. The rules are important because businesses and organizations must comply with the wage and hour provisions of FLSA for employees but not for independent contractors. Although school districts do not routinely deal with the scenario of questioning whether someone is an employee or independent contractor, it does come up on occasion.

Over the last few weeks, it seems like everyone is talking about vaccines. "Have you gotten it?" "Are you a 1a or a 1b?" "How do I get my shot?"

New Classroom Quarantine Guidelines 

The Ohio Department of Health issued a new fact sheet  K-12 School Quarantine Guidelines. The new guidelines stem from a study that showed children who had close contact (defined as within six feet for 15 minutes) to infected individuals and appropriately masked had rates of COVID-19 that were similar to children with no known COVID-19 exposure in school.

The joint OSBA/OASBO workers’ compensation program is excited to announce that CompManagement Health Systems, Inc. (CompManagement MCO) is merging with CareWorks of Ohio, Ltd. (CareWorks MCO), effective Monday, Dec. 21, 2020. This merger accompanies a name change to Sedgwick Managed Care Ohio (Sedgwick MCO).

Sedgwick, CompManagement’s parent company, acquired CareWorks in 2019. For the past 16 months, the teams at CareWorks and CompManagement have partnered to develop best practices to ensure outstanding outcomes remain available to school district.

Pursuant to RC 3313.14, school boards must set the date of their January organizational meeting by Dec. 31.