Educators make more reports to child protective services agencies than any other group of mandated reporters, but statistics show that educators are the least reliable mandated reporters. In New York City, school officials’ calls to the Statewide Central Register of Child Abuse and Maltreatment (SCR) frequently trigger investigations into families by the Administration for Children’s Services (ACS). An ACS investigation is typically an invasive and traumatizing process for the children and their parents. 

The impact of an ACS investigation can weigh particularly heavily on families of disabled children. Children with disabilities make up more than 20% of the student population in New York City, but data troublingly suggests that disabled students represent a significantly larger share of educators’ reports to the SCR. Parents of students with disabilities frequently undergo a challenging and protracted adversarial process to obtain appropriate educational services for their children from New York City’s Department of Education (DOE). Rather than assisting parents and understanding that schools and parents may reasonably disagree over a child’s educational needs, DOE has enabled a pattern in which DOE staff regularly report parents to the Statewide Central Register of Child Abuse and Maltreatment (SCR) in retaliation for parents’ advocacy for their children.   

This unlawful practice by DOE violates the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the Americans with Disabilities Act, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, and the New York City Human Rights Law.