In the last month the U.S. Supreme Court has issued a number of rulings that have significant impact on schools and teachers. Today on the podcast we’re going to focus in on three of those cases, review their history, and what the Supreme Court’s latest rulings means for educators.
In the last month the U.S. Supreme Court has issued a number of rulings that have significant impact on schools and teachers. Today on the podcast we’re going to focus in on three of those cases, review their history, and what the Supreme Court’s latest rulings means for educators.
Joining us to help us understand these cases is Heinemann author Robert Kim, who recently wrote Elevating Equity and Justice: Ten U.S. Supreme Court Cases Every Teacher Should Know.
Bob is a former civil rights attorney and the co-author of Education and the Law, 5thed. and Legal Issues in Education: Rights and Responsibilities in U.S. Public Schools Today. He has advised thousands of educators on civil rights and school climate issues in public schools. He has also served as a senior policy analyst at the National Education Association.
Earlier in his career, as a staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, he engaged in litigation and advocacy pertaining to race, criminal and juvenile justice, bullying and harassment, LGBTQ rights, and student rights.
Today we’ll be covering the recent rulings related to DACA, Religious Education and public funding and the landmark LGBT Rights case. We started off our conversation on the history of the DACA case…
Below is a full transcript of this episode.
Brett: So Bob, in the last few weeks, the Supreme Court has been issuing a lot of big changes that we want to take a minute with you to talk about. There's a lot of things that you've previously written about in your book that we really need to revisit with these updates over the last month. So we thought what we would do is talk to you about each one of these cases.
So why don't we start with DACA? The court recently just made a big decision on an attempt to dismantle the program. Can you tell us a little bit about what the case was that the Supreme Court was looking at and what the issue was there?
Bob: Sure. As we recall, there is a program that's called DACA, or Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. This was a program that was started in 2012 by the Obama administration. And if we remember, DACA was never a pathway to permanent residency or citizenship, it was, essentially, an agreement by the federal government not to enforce the immigration laws to deport certain young people brought to the United States at an early age. These are undocumented immigrants. The DACA program really allowed these individuals to, essentially, have amnesty, allow them to get work authorization, get a driver's license, go to college, receive government benefits, all without fearing deportation by the federal government.
So this was a deferral of deportation agreement that individuals could sign up for and they would have to renew their DACA status every two years. So this was really a program that started by the Obama administration. It had a real impact on teachers and schools, because as we know, there were tens of thousands of DACA recipients who were public school teachers, and of course, hundreds of thousands of students and their families, and almost every educator, I think, works in a school or a district who had DACA kids in their classrooms. So even if you weren't directly experiencing DACA in your own family or in your own life, you certainly were around kids who were constantly fearing immigration consequences, just even being in school. And so that was something that has been an issue for teachers for many years.
Brett: Well, and as some of the writing out there notes, it's not just students that are currently, which there are thousands of students currently in school districts, but also students that have graduated and now have children of their own, that could have ramifications to parents that this could affect as well. Right?
Bob: That's right. That's right. It's students themselves, the students grow up, they have their own children, they could be separated from their own children. And it's their whole extended family.
And really, to drive it home, how it affects so many teachers around the country, there are studies that show how teachers have experienced increasing stress levels from having to manage to understand what's going on with DACA students and their families and really to help their students to cope with the fact that they themselves, or their parents, or their friends, may either be deported or be separated from their family members. And so this is incredibly stressful, not just for the actual students, but for educators who are around and are responsible for teaching those students.
Brett: So how did this specific lawsuit come about, and how did it make its way up to the Supreme Court?
Bob: Well, as we recall, the Trump administration in 2017 announced that it wanted to end DACA. It did so because it claimed that the Obama administration had improperly or unlawfully created the program to begin with, that essentially, only Congress could create a new class of immigrants with these special rights, and that it was not the job of the White House or the president, then President Obama, to do that. So it ended the program with this claim that the DACA program was unlawful.
So what that did, was it halted all new applications to the DACA program, but then of course, there were all these existing recipients of DACA who were left hanging there. Many of them ended up challenging the decision of the Trump administration to end the program in court. So there were multiple lawsuits saying, essentially, that it was unfair and illegal to terminate the program in the way that it did. And so that's when the litigation happened.
Brett: I think my perspective of the Supreme Court's ruling has been a little, I've been a little confused by it because there's some people that have said one thing or the other about how it rules. But how exactly did the Supreme Court rule, and what is then the impact of that ruling?
Bob: Right, so there were a bunch of cases that went up to the Supreme Court and then were consolidated, in what became known as the Department of Homeland Security versus the Regents of University of California case. So that was the case, that consolidated case, that went to the US Supreme Court. Chief Justice Roberts wrote the majority opinion in the decision that came out last month, and essentially upheld DACA by a very razor thin five to four margin. The chief justice wrote that it was, essentially, a violation of federal law for the Trump administration to end the program in the way that it did.
There is a federal law that requires eight federal agencies to engage in reasoned decision-making about when it intends to act in the way that it does. And so no one disputes that the administration had the right to end the DACA program, but the law requires you to do this in a reasoned way, in a way that is not "arbitrary or capricious." And what the Supreme Court did in last month's opinion, is say that the Trump administration did act in an arbitrary and capricious way.
First of all, it just had different explanations for why it was ending the DACA program, and the reasoning for its ending the program shifted over time, I think in response to litigation, actually. Basically the court said, "Trump administration, you didn't properly consider the impact of ending the DACA program on the recipients who were relying on that program to live their lives or to get education. And you also didn't explain fully why you had to rescind all aspects of DACA."
I mean, there's both this aspect of DACA where you're "forbearing or deferring" deportation. And then there's another part of DACA where it's all of the benefits that you get by being a DACA recipient, whether it's government benefits or work authorizations and so forth. So the Trump administration never really explained why it had to end both parts of that and not just one or the other. So that alone is ... When you don't explain yourself well in ending the program, and you don't consider what the impact will be on people, that's arbitrary and capricious, said the court, and it was a violation of federal law for it to end the program in the way that-
Brett: So where does that leave the DACA program currently? What is the impact of this ruling on DACA moving forward?
Bob: Yeah, well, the immediate relief, big sighs of relief around the country, that hundreds of thousands of existing DACA recipients are still on DACA, still get DACA, and don't have to immediately drop out of work or school or go into hiding or figure out what to do with their lives. So that is temporary relief. The Trump administration has announced after that ruling, the DACA ruling, the Supreme Court's ruling, that it will file paperwork, and it may even come this week, as we're talking on this podcast, to essentially push forward and still try to get rid of DACA.
And so what that means, is it will have to conform with what the Supreme Court said in this case about how to end DACA properly, go through the proper reasoning and explain yourself in a way that is not arbitrary and capricious. So the Trump administration plans to do that. I don't know how they can do that so quickly because if you go back and read the Supreme Court opinion, you really have to consider the impact on all of the recipients. And, to me, that would probably involve talking to them and understanding what all the various implications are of removing DACA from peoples' lives. So I don't have great confidence that the paperwork that they will file to get rid of DACA is going to be thorough or complete.
And so for sure, there's going to be legal challenges arising again, as to saying that you're still not rescinding this program properly. The question really remains whether those legal hurdles will be able to be surmounted in time before the election, the presidential election. Because it can take quite a while to move its way back up through the courts, and then we'll have the November elections, we'll see what happens there. So really, the Trump administration is running up against a political and electoral deadline here to rescind DACA.
Brett: You also noted in your writing on this, that even for a DACA recipient, renewing their status as a DACA person, still even right now, outside of this opens them up to further scrutiny.
Bob: Well, there's a lot of uncertainty for current DACA recipients. It's whether to renew their status. Certainly for anyone who is not a DACA recipient, who is considering applying for DACA, now, technically many read the opinion as sort of putting this program back to its original footing where people could apply for a DACA, even if they hadn't received it before. Certainly that doesn't seem likely given that the Trump administration is now moving to end the program altogether, even for existing recipients. But there's a lot of risk in applying for, or renewing DACA. Because again, we have to remember that there's always the specter of deportation hanging over people. And so identifying yourself to the government, you're doing that with an understanding that the government is making an agreement with you not to deport you.
If the government reneges on that or says, sort of gotcha. Now I know who you are and I am going to go deport you. You can see why there'd be a lot of fear by individuals, whether they should apply for DACA in the first instance, or even renew DACA. Although the fear is a little less because you already have received DACA, so you're already known to the government. But certainly there will be some discussion, I think, with DACA recipients and their advisors as to whether or how they should continue to try to retain their DACA status.
Brett: So I'd like to move on to the next case, which is involving religious education and public funding. And this case was around a Montana tax incentive. Can you tell us a little bit about what the issue was in that case and what happened there?
Bob: Sure. Well, Montana made a decision. The Montana legislature made a decision to give up to $150 in tax credits to individuals who would then contribute to a private scholarship fund. And out of that scholarship fund, families could get up to $500 in tuition aid to enable Montana parents to send their kids to private schools. So essentially, this was a government incentive program to aid poor people to send their kids to private school. So, so far it doesn't sound that bad, right? But there were a couple hackles in this case. The first hackle that arose for many people was this whole notion of government sponsored funds going to private schools. There are many ways that this is happening in states across the country. There's direct payment vouchers to taxpayers in many states in which you literally get a lump sum to be able to partially defray tuition cost to private schools. So that's a voucher program.
And then there's also these so called Neo vouchers proliferating. That's what happens in Montana, in this case, where it's a little more indirect, the public benefit to private schools. It's essentially a tax credit offered by the government that then goes to a private school sort of tuition, private organization that collects that money, the donations from people who got the tax credit, and then that scholarship money then goes toward tuition for private school. So those are these so called Neo vouchers. So, that's been happening a lot in a few dozen states around the country. So we have this first hackle, which is government sponsored funds going to private schools.
So the second hackle that arose in this case is that Montana and like many other States had a No Aid constitutional provision, which bars public funds from being used to send kids to religious schools. This is to avoid the entanglement of church and state, which we know is the First Amendment rule in the U.S. Constitution in which the government can not get too involved in funding or controlling religion.
Brett: So, Bob, what is the implication of this on teachers?
Bob: Well, the teachers and public school should be concerned about this case on multiple levels. One is as citizens. There's a question of how we feel about the entanglement of the government with religion in education, essentially the redirecting of taxpayer and state revenue to go to private and even parochial schools. So that's number one.
Teachers and public schools also, especially those who are public school employees, may also be concerned about the school funding issue because money for public schools, as we know, is often driven by, is largely driven by, things like student attendance. And there's a limited pot of money in states to cover public school salaries, building maintenance, supplies and so forth. And so state policy around what money should go to public versus private schools really is a controlling factor in how many resources, I, let's say as an educator, have in my classroom or in my school.
And then finally, for those who are supportive of religious education and private education and this so-called school choice debate, there are implications for those individuals as well in a case like this.
Brett: So how then did this case make its way to the Supreme Court?
Bob: So, this case came to a head because the State of Montana, in order to follow its own constitutional, No Aid to religious education provision, the state government added a rule governing this private school tax credit program saying that scholarship recipients of that program could not use the money to send their kids to religious schools in Montana. And so this rule forbidding the scholarship money to pay for religious education was challenged by a parent named Kendra Espinoza and some other parents who wanted to apply for these scholarships to keep their children enrolled in what was called Stillwater Christian School in Montana.
And so they challenged the Montana rule in state court. And what's a little bit weird about how this came to the U.S. Supreme Court is that the Montana Supreme court then ruled to abolish the entire scholarship program, not just for religious schools, but for any private schools. And so arguably there really wasn't any discrimination against religion anymore after what the Montana Supreme Court did, because there was just no scholarship program for anyone, religious person, religious school or not. But the Supreme Court, U.S. Supreme court still voted to hear the case. And the argument, then, by Kendra Espinoza and the other parents in Montana was that the State of Montana was discriminating against religious schools and families in denying access to these public/private scholarships, which violated their right to the free exercise of their religion under the U.S. Constitution. And that was essentially their argument, which then made it a federal issue, and then off to the U.S. Supreme Court it went.
Brett: So from there, how did the Supreme court rule? That's the U.S. Supreme Court. Sorry.
Bob: Yes, right. There's a couple of different Supreme courts here. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled by a vote of five to four, again, a razor thin margin here that the Montana Supreme Court decision striking down this tax credit program to fund scholarships, that their decision to strike down that program was unconstitutional. Chief Justice Roberts wrote that the Montana Supreme Court's interpretation of its own constitution to strike down the tax credit program violated the federal right of these parents and schools and religious schools to the free exercise of religion, which is protected by the federal, the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
The key sentence of the opinion, I would say, is that the court said, "A state need not subsidize private education, but once it decides to do so, it cannot disqualify some private schools solely because they are religious." And so you have a very broad ruling that is arguably opening up a lot of state programs and government-funded programs to religious and parochial education.
Brett: Being that it is so broad, what is the impact now of this ruling for states, moving forward?
Bob: Well, for Montana, first of all, the case will have to go back to the Montana Supreme Court, which has been chastised, I would say, you could say. And that court will likely have to revive the scholarship program and make sure there's no blanket religious school of restriction on participating in the program. And for the 37 or so other states, including Montana, that have these constitutions that prohibit religious institutions from receiving state aid, these are so called Blaine Amendments. Those provisions, I would say are effectively toast. I mean, The Supreme Court is saying you really cannot prohibit religious schools just by virtue of their status from receiving public state aid. And so the legislature is in States all over the country will have to either eliminate all state aid to private schools or the legislatures or the courts of those States will have to amend and interpret these state aid provisions. So as to somehow not single out religious schools for exclusion based on their status as religious schools. I will note that there's a real slim opening here or distinction between religious status and religious use of public money. And so after the ruling of The U.S. Supreme Court, the government, it's clear, cannot discriminate against applicants for public funds or recipients of public funds purely based on religious status. But they might still be able to bar public money from going directly to support religious "uses", including religious instruction or religious pedagogy.
But that distinction also is on thin ice as well. So we'll have to see what Montana and other States do. Whether they try to say, sure you can allow state money to go to religious schools to support tuition, but you can't actually use state money to support religious instruction let's say. Or another type of religious use, like preparing clergy to teach in the classroom. You can't do that. But sure, you can use the money for things like tuition. Tuition in some ways, for religious schools that does support clergy and religious instruction. So this is a very tenuous distinction that may or may not still remain after this case.
Brett: It sounds like a lot more still to come on this issue.
Bob: Absolutely. And I'll just say that the broader impact here is that we will see religious schools increasingly seek to access state funding directly for things like transportation and textbooks and student tuition support. And so this wall between vouchers and neo vouchers and really direct funding of schools, religious schools to the extent one perceives there to be a wall at all, are really coming down. And so we have to watch out for how public funds are used and how they're distributed really between public schools, private schools, and parochial schools.
Brett: Moving onto the next case that probably most everybody had heard about. Probably the case that took most of the headlines really, was the LGBTQ case that The Supreme Court heard about not being discriminated or fired for being gay or transgender. Can you tell us a little bit about this really huge landmark case? What the case was? What the issue was in this case? And how it came about?
Bob: Sure. Well, many people will be surprised that LGBT employment discrimination was still a thing in the majority of States. We've heard about gay marriage. We've heard about so many advances in rights over the last several years. And it may be surprising for people to recall that really up until this ruling, only 21 States and the district of Columbia had statutes fully protecting people on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity in public and private employment from discrimination. And so in the majority of the country, prior to this ruling, it was okay to fire someone purely for being gay or lesbian or for being transgender. And that was really the status quo up until this case.
Now there's a federal law called Title VII, which protects against discrimination employment for both public and private employers based on certain categories, such as race and color and national origin and religion. And also based on sex. And this Title VII federal law covers public and private employers in workplaces of 15 or more people. Now in recent years, there have really been questions about whether this sex discrimination provision under Title VII covers categories like sexual orientation and, or transgender status and courts and agencies like the EEOC and state and city governments were beginning to take that issue on and had begun to provide this patchwork of protections for gay and, or transgender people all over the country. But there was really no national rule on this. And so it was really, very locally based. But broadly speaking, the majority of the country, you could still be fired for gay or trans status across the country.
Brett: And specifically for educators this is of note, because as you noted, only 21 States have laws in the district of Columbia explicitly talking about this. But many teachers couldn't come out. Many teachers were scared to be out, so that has a significant impact on teachers.
Bob: Yeah, absolutely. For teachers in schools, obviously the impact on LGBT teachers who could be fired summarily based on their status in the majority of States. And also this case is important for schools and teachers because in legal circles, we know that Title VII cases often impact Title IX cases and Title IX is the law that directly prohibits sex discrimination against not only employees, but also students in schools. So what happens in Title VII impacts what happens in Title IX and that's why many people in education circles I think, were following this case closely because of it's probable impact on discrimination in schools generally.
Brett: So how then did this specific lawsuit come about?
Bob: This case came about because there were three courageous individuals who decided that they didn't like what had happened to them in their jobs. Gerald Bostock was this award winning child welfare advocate who worked in a child welfare agency. He decided to participate in a gay softball league recreationally, in the state of Georgia. And then he was fired from his job.
Then there was another plaintiff by the name of Donald Zarda. He was a sky diving instructor in the state of New York. Again, I don't know how sexual orientation has anything to do with skydiving per se. But he happened to mention he was gay and guess what? He was fired. He no longer can be a sky diving instructor.
And then there was a third plaintiff by the name of Amy Stevens. She worked in a funeral home in Michigan. She transitioned after several years on the job to identify as female and shortly after she did that, and identified, and let her employer know that, she was fired from her job at the funeral home. So they all sued in their respective States and they had received different results in the lower courts. I think two of them prevailing and one of them not prevailing in the lower courts.
Brett: How did those then move their way up to The Supreme Court? Because I think you noted the first one was Bostock versus Clayton County. Was that the one that became the one that moved up? Or how did the three come together to The Supreme Court?
Bob: Well, all three cases moved up to through The Federal Court system, to the level immediately below The Supreme Court. And then when they all applied to have their cases be reviewed by The U.S. Supreme Court, The U.S. Supreme Court accepted them all and essentially combined them into one case. And that became known as the Bostock case here. But really what they were considering was the claims of all three plaintiffs. And it's just very interesting because it's such a broad ruling. It's very rare that you would get a case to deal with both a major category of discrimination, like sexual orientation discrimination and a major case dealing with transgender discrimination all in one case. But that's what happened here in the case that has become known and now forever as Bostock versus Clayton County.
Brett: So the ruling was significant. And I'm going to ask you about how the court ruled in a second, but it was well noted that it was quite dense, the ruling in how it was written. But you've helped us one in on exactly how this is. So could you just walk us through, how did The Supreme Court rule on this?
Bob: Justice Gorsuch wrote a wrote for... It was a six to three opinion and Justice Gorsuch wrote for the majority that "An employer who fires an individual merely for being gay or transgender defies the law". And this is very significant. And the way that he explained that sexual orientation and transgender status actually fall under this umbrella category of sex discrimination, is basically by saying that there's no part of being lesbian or gay or being transgender, that does not involve sex in some way in the workplace. If I were to try to explain it quickly, say in terms of sexual orientation, say that you're an employee who, and you are male and you are attracted to females and your employer does not mind that, but then you're a male who's attracted to males and employer does mind that, you can see how sex is involved in that distinction, by the employer, even though we're talking about sexual orientation in a sense. The same thing with transgender status, and Justice Gorsuch was very careful to go through this logic by saying that if you are a male who was assigned a male sex at birth, and you continue to identify as male, the employer might not mind that, but if you are a female assigned a female sex at birth, and then you now identify as male, the employer may mind that.
Even though we're talking about transgender people and employees, there is a question of sex, the distinction of sex that is somehow inescapably at the heart of that type of discrimination in the workplace and justice Gorsuch, who is known as a textualist, is somebody who really goes by the logic of the words of statutes, he was, he used that approach in examining the text of this statute, Title VII and came out with a very liberal result, which is not usually what most people think of when they think of applying textualism to legal opinions. It was a surprising result, but it was one that I think we can talk about further, was monumental in expanding rights for the LGBT community.
Brett: I want to ask you a question here. I've noticed because he specifically wrote gay or transgender, there was some confusion in the bisexual and pan communities, feeling that they were excluded in this ruling because it specifically says gay or transgender. But some have said it does definitely cover bisexual and pan and others under the LGBTQ plus community. I know that's sort of a broad question, Bob, that we didn't talk about beforehand, so if you don't feel comfortable tackling that, that's okay. But I wanted to just throw that out there to you.
Bob: Yeah, sure. Well, I don't think that the case, it's true mentioned, let's say bisexual people by category, but if you follow the logic of the opinion, it's clear that that Justice Gorsuch was saying that somebody that is different, based on who they're attracted to, that it's not proper, that it's improper sex discrimination for an employer to treat that person worse because of that or fire them. So, you would think that a bisexual person who is attracted to both men and women, let's say, if an employer fired them or demoted them or treated them unfairly because of that, that they would still be captured by this opinion, they would still be protected, presumably by this opinion. There may be future cases that talk about other categories within the LGBT community. But I think it's probably safe to say that distinctions in how you treat employees, based on their attractions are based on their sexual orientation in various different forms would all be protected by this opinion.
Brett: With that said, what is the impact moving forward? It feels pretty obvious. Is it that obvious? Is it, are we safe?
Bob: Well, I think this is a huge opinion. I mean, if you think about it, nearly every employer with 15 or more employees in the country is impacted by this ruling. In my opinion, this is probably the most significant civil rights advancements since, let's say, the establishment of the Americans With Disabilities Act in 1990. It's certainly the biggest trans case ever. I would argue, even though we've had these recent blockbuster rulings on gay marriage and things like that, I would argue it's probably one of the most significant lesbian or gay rights cases in history. It's clear that the civil rights laws of the majority of states in the United States will have to conform to this ruling. Employer by employer, you can see an employer non-discrimination trainings will probably go through the roof after this opinion. Everyone's going to have to get trained up on how not to discriminate and to make sure that they're abiding by this ruling.
Now, the interesting thing is that this case applies only in the employment context for now, but you many are saying that it could reverberate to affect things like in the school setting, like transgender participation in athletics, transgender student issues around the use of facilities in schools. So, even though this is an employment decision, as we know, once you say you're equal in one top context, it's hard not to say that you're also equal in another context. There's, many people do think that this ruling will reverberate far beyond employment in the years to come.
Brett: Those are three very big cases, Bob. How, wrapping it all up for teachers where outcome, bringing all three of those together, what would be your big takeaway for teachers as we reflect back on these three cases?
Bob: Well, if you're a US Supreme court wonk, like I am, I would say that this is a very illuminating year in the law for, both generally and for education in public schools. We know from looking at these three cases that Chief Justice John Roberts controls this court. He was in the majority in all of these cases. He is the swing vote on the Supreme Court. So, we know that he's in charge and you could say that in certain areas, if not all areas, he's swung a little bit to the left, as he's realized what the dynamics of the court are and where the country is at. Also, you could tell from these three cases that the court is all over the place ideologically. They are very either far right or far left in ways that become very clear if you read not only the majority opinion in these cases, but all of the other concurring and dissenting opinions in the cases as well.
For these three issues, DACA, LGBT rights and school funding and religious education, we can say DACA is hanging on by a thread. This is a very much still a White House-controlled program and the federal election is coming up. For LGBT rights, hooray for the expansion of rights, to LG and transgender people and employees. We'll have to watch to see how this affects Title IX and LGBT discrimination in schools in particular. School funding, as a result of this religious education case, I think we can say that it's getting more complicated. There's the school funding provided by the state is getting more spread out to both public schools and private schools, and now increasingly, more religious schools. We'll have to see how that affects school budgets in this next coming year, especially given the coronavirus pandemic and the reduction in money for public schools, as a result of the pandemic.
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Learn more about Elevating Equity and Justice at Heinemann.com
Robert (Bob) Kim is a leading expert in education law and policy in the United States.
A former civil rights attorney, Bob is the co-author of Education and the Law, 5thed. and Legal Issues in Education: Rights and Responsibilities in U.S. Public Schools Today (West Academic Publishing, 2019 & 2017). He also wrote Let’s Get Real: Lessons and Activities to Address Name-calling & Bullying (Groundspark, 2004) and has advised thousands of educators on civil rights and school climate issues in public schools.
Bob currently serves as an education adviser and consultant on civil rights and equity issues. Through 2019, he was the William T. Grant Distinguished Fellow at Rutgers University, where he conducted research on school finance and education equity in U.S. public schools.
From 2011 through 2016, he served in the Obama Administration as Deputy Assistant Secretary in the U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights, which enforces federal civil rights laws in K-12 and postsecondary institutions nationwide.
He has also served as a senior policy analyst at the National Education Association, where he advised school personnel on human and civil rights issues and worked to replace the No Child Left Behind Act.
Earlier in his career, as a staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, Bob engaged in litigation and advocacy pertaining to race, criminal and juvenile justice, bullying and harassment, LGBT rights, and student rights.
Bob holds a BA from Williams College and an JD from Boston College Law School.
You can find Bob on Twitter @bob__kim.
