Requested Information
By way of the Maryland Public Information Act, I am requesting to receive any and all student arrest data documents that Howard County Public Schools has prepared in compliance with COMAR 13A.08.01.12 and the Maryland Student Arrest Data Collection Manual (http://marylandpublicschools.org/about/Documents/DSFSS/SSSP/StudentArrest/20152016StudentArrestsManual072016.pdf) for the 2015-16 and 2016-17 school years.
Status
Complete
Response Notes
A 2016-2017 report to MSDE on student arrest data does not yet exist as HCPSS is awaiting directions/instructions from MSDE. Thus, per your response seeking “MSDE communication that specifies there will be changes to the 2016-17 student data collection process,” we do not have any existing documentation.
Responsive Documents
2015-2016 student arrest report (all levels) as prepared by HCPSS and submitted to the Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE). Please note, the fields (school name, school level, gender, race, date of arrest, arresting offense and location of arrest) included in the HCPSS submission were the only details collected from police reports for those incidents the local police indicated were student arrests (as we were not yet collecting our own data) for this initial report. In order to protect against potential release of a disciplinary record of an individual student, which would be protected under both the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (FERPA), which restricts access to student records, and MPIA GP § 4-313, which prevents disclosure of school district records pertaining to individual students, we have separated out the arresting offenses on the second sheet of this document.