Greeley-Evans School District 6 officials have denied a parent access to video footage of his son’s involvement in an altercation on the school bus.
Denver's Fox affiliate is reporting that Cody Moskalski, 13, has been suspended from the riding the school bus for ten days after getting into a fight with another boy over a seat.
“This kid told me to move out of my seat and I said no and then he attacked and I defended myself," Cody told Fox. "First he pushed me over, then I kicked him."
For Cody's father, Mike Moskalski, the punishment is far in excess of the crime - and he believes he may have proof. Made aware that the altercation was captured on videotape, he sought to have access to the footage.
When he approached district officials, however, his request was declined. They say that they were following the legal advice of district attorneys, classifying the tape as "educational record." Under district policy, such records are restricted from being publicly released without parental consent, meaning that in order to release the tape, the district would have to blur the faces of all the other students or get permission slips from their parents.
But what about Cody's rights? A ten-day suspension could weight heavily on his academic career, especially in an era when students are only rarely offered due process in our classrooms and on our campuses. More importantly, if the district is using such footage to catch students behaving poorly, shouldn't district policy also dictate that students are allowed to use this same evidence to defend themselves against unfair allegations?
We hope that for the sake of the Moskalski family - and for every kid accused (in our case, wrongly accused, of course) of ever shooting a spitwad from the back of the bus to the kid sitting in the front row - that the tape is released.