Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If a school tells you that you can't do what's right by your child because "it's the law," ask for the citation of the law. If it's really a law, there is a citation, and the law can be looked up. In the United States, under its Anglo-American system of law, the default assumption is individual liberty (and parents rather than schools acting in the interests of minor children), so make sure to check the specific la…
Dan, to the contrary, the parents I have advised in this manner for two decades report good results in getting school districts to back away from illegal restrictions on family decisions once the parents show that they know how to ask about the law. Simply asking for a citation when a government official tells you what to do is enormously helpful. (It may be especially helpful here in Minnesota, where for more than t…
That's excellent advice, and it's something I quite often. "I don't know your system, and so I don't know who to ask or what questions to ask. What do you suggest?" turns unhelpful conversations into productive discussion.
In the UK there has been some problem with photographing your children at school events. Schools claim compliance with a variety of laws, but the reality is they just don't want people taking photographs.
(http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/jun/23/photos-ch...)
> But only recently news emerged of a parent who, in 2007, was threatened with arrest by police as he arrived at his daughter's school if he proceeded to break the school's ban on photography at a nativity play. The same school in Leicestershire still has the ban in place, although photographs can be taken after the performance is completed.
This follows a weird restriction on photography in public in general in the UK. Youtube has many videos of people being told by police to stop taking photographs in public. This has been such a problem that one police service had to issue updated guidance.