Requestor
Candice Svogda
Requested Information
If a student is arrested and charged for a certain subset of crimes while off school campuses, these report offenses are sent to their school district. Fox Baltimore reported that Brian Bassett, Director of Communications and Engagment for HCPSS noted there were 30 report offenses received by HCPSS since 7/1/2024.
Requesting a breakdown of each of these 30 offenses. Please include date sent, any information about student (grade, age, sex, race or other demographic), crime information (date and location of crime, type of offense etc), which school the student was assigned to, and any further information that can be made available, including disposition of student/case. Also please make full communication report/email available for each of the 30 offenses.
Requesting a breakdown of each of these 30 offenses. Please include date sent, any information about student (grade, age, sex, race or other demographic), crime information (date and location of crime, type of offense etc), which school the student was assigned to, and any further information that can be made available, including disposition of student/case. Also please make full communication report/email available for each of the 30 offenses.
Date Received
Status
Complete
Response Notes
Responsive to this request, MPIA GP § 4-301(a)(2)(i) requires an agency to deny inspection of any part of a public record that would be contrary to State statute. As such, we are unable to release the communication/report under both Courts and Judicial Proceedings § 3-8A-27 which indicates juvenile police and court records are confidential, as well as Education § 7-303 (d)(1) which indicates notification of reportable offenses to schools is confidential and may not be redisclosed outside those who have explicit purposes for use under the statue.
Responsive Documents
In regard to the 30 report offenses received by the school system since July 1, 2024, for active HCPSS students noted at the time of the news article, please find attached available data requested. Please note, this record is used by staff for reporting purposes to the Maryland State Department of Education at the conclusion of the school year, and as such, columns on disposition of the student’s placement may not be entered at this time. Any entries containing “option 1” mean the data was not received or has not yet been entered by staff. Additionally, the location of crime is not reported. HCPSS must protect against the potential disclosures of personally identifiable information about students as required by 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. In accordance, given this report contains information on an incident-specific level about individual student reportable offenses, each data point requested is de-identified on separate sheets to avoid the potential release of both student education records and juvenile records as noted above. Individual school names are also being withheld given the small population per school, however level has been provided.