Simon Bernstein sat in the front row of the courtroom Tuesday as state Supreme Court justices, an assistant attorney general and two law students grappled over the meaning of his words.

Back in 1965, Bernstein had been largely responsible for crafting an article added to the state constitution guaranteeing “free public elementary and secondary schools.” A former Hartford alderman and Bloomfield school board member, Bernstein’s experience with local school funding debates had convinced him of the need to make education a fundamental right.

“I thought I was giving a simple clear statement without any unnecessary words that could be misinterpreted,” said Bernstein, now 95 and a retired judge.

But on Tuesday, the exact meaning of those words were up for debate as the state Supreme Court heard arguments in a lawsuit challenging the way the state funds education.

The lawsuit was brought against the state on behalf of 10 families with children in public schools and the Connecticut Coalition for Justice in Education Funding, a group of education and municipal organizations.

It claims that the state fails to maintain a suitable and substantially equal education system by providing inadequate resources and conditions for education in many school districts, leaving students unprepared for jobs or continuing education and likely politically and socially marginalized.

Read the entire Hartford Courant story by Arielle Levin Becker

Connecticut’s Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a special appeal Tuesday-part of the school finance case brought by the Connecticut Coalition for Justice in Education Funding.

In 2005 a coalition of municipalities, boards of ed, parents and teachers known as CCJEF filed a lawsuit, charging that Connecticut’s public financing system violates students’ constitutional right to an equitable and adequate education. Last year, a Superior court judge dismissed the “adequacy” part of the lawsuit.; CCJEF appealed straight to the Connecticut Supreme Court.

Much of the hearing centered around - how to define an “adequate” or “suitable” education. Two Yale Law School students argued on behalf of the plaintiffs. They pointed to underperforming schools in Bridgeport and Meriden and said the state’s constitution gives these students the right to be prepared for a world beyond high school.

Read the entire NPR story by Diane Orson

Thousands of Connecticut children are receiving inferior educations that are failing to adequately prepare them for later life, Yale Law School students charged Tuesday before the state Supreme Court.

Poor educational quality is holding children back in cities such as Bridgeport, while other school systems, especially in the wealthier suburbs, are preparing their children to join the 21st century’s global economy, they said.

“The problem is that at some schools, students aren’t learning,” said Neil Weare, 27, a third-year law student. “When they graduate, they simply cannot read. They don’t have the math skills to go on to college or even to get a meaningful living-wage job.”

Weare and David Noah, a second-year law student, were allowed to argue before the state’s highest court as part of the Yale Law Education Adequacy Project, savings plaintiffs millions of dollars.

The project filed the suit in November 2005 for plaintiffs including Nekita Carroll-Hall, of Bridgeport, who has two children in the local school system. The suit was rejected at the lower court level, setting the scene for Tuesday’s make-or-break hearing in a packed courtroom.

“No matter how you describe it, the purposes of public education are clear and these purposes are to prepare students to — after graduation — be able to get a job or go on to college, to be able to be effective citizens within our democracy,” Weare said. “We’re asking the court to decide whether the state is meeting its constitutional duties.”

“Thirty years ago, this court recognized that Connecticut schoolchildren have the fundamental right to education,” Noah said. “The question before the court today is whether that right has any meaningful content.”

Read the entire Connecticut Post story by Ken Dixon

Two Yale Law School students will advocate for more than 600,000 Connecticut schoolchildren before the state Supreme Court in Hartford today.

For the two students in Yale’s Education Adequacy Clinic, David Noah LAW ‘09 and Neil Weare LAW ‘08, more than a year of work will culminate today as they present their oral argument in a case that will decide whether Connecticut’s constitution, which has guaranteed the right to an education since 1965, entails some baseline quality of education. The students will argue it does, on behalf of the Connecticut Coalition for Justice in Education Funding, the lead plaintiff in the suit.

The state Supreme Court has previously read the constitution to include the right to equal educational opportunity - but some opportunities may be more equal than others, according to the students.

“Just equal could be equally poor,” said Brian Savage LAW ‘09, another student in the clinic. The suit contends that there must be a minimum standard.

Read the entire Yale Daily News story by Issac Arnsdorf

Yale law students will argue before the state Supreme Court today against what they claim to be a state educational funding system that unconstitutionally denies students in poorer municipalities “suitable and substantially equal educational opportunities.”

On Nov. 22, 2005, 15 Connecticut families and the Connecticut Coalition for Justice in Education Funding filed suit against numerous state parties, including Gov. M. Jodi Rell and the state Board of Education, asking the court to declare the current education funding system unconstitutional.

“The level of resources provided by the state’s education funding scheme is arbitrary and not related to the actual costs of providing a suitable education. By failing to maintain an educational system that provides children with suitable and substantially equal opportunities, the state is violating plaintiffs’ constitutional rights,” the suit charges.

Read the entire New Haven Register story by Elizabeth Benton

The Connecticut Supreme Court will be asked Tuesday to determine if Connecticut schoolchildren have a right to an adequate education.

Yale Law students filed the case against the state more than two years ago on behalf of 15 students and their families that feel the quality of education is falling far short of its intended goal. The Attorney General’s office is expected to argue on behalf of the state.

“By recognizing that each child in this State has the right to an adequate education, the Supreme Court can empower the Legislature to provide our children with the kind of education they deserve,” David Noah, one of the law students who will make the oral arguments to the court, said in a press release.

At the press conference Monday, East Hartford Mayor Melody Currey said the fact that the state could argue there is no right to an adequate “education under the Connecticut constitution strikes me as preposterous.”

“Surely out beloved Attorney General has gotten the State’s position all wrong!” she added.

Nekita Carroll-Hall, one of the plaintiff’s in the case, said “I have seen how grossly underfunded the Bridgeport schools truly are.” She said the class sizes are too large and books, computers, and instructional staff are too limited.

Read the entire CT News Junkie story by Christine Stuart

A nonprofit advocacy group will go before the state Supreme Court this week to push its claim that the state’s failure to adequately fund public schools has irreparably harmed thousands of schoolchildren.

Two Yale Law School students, Neil Weare and David Noah, from the school’s Education Adequacy Clinic, will argue Tuesday on behalf of the Connecticut Coalition for Justice in Education Funding (CCJEF).

“I went to public schools growing up,” Weare said. “I want to ensure the opportunity I was able to have in public school are available to all students, no matter where they are.”

“The question the Supreme Court is deciding is, does the right to education guarantee the right to a suitable education for every child,” said Brian Savage, another clinic member. “If not, it’s an equally deficient education for everybody.”

The suit was filed by the Coalition for Justice in Education Funding against Gov. M. Jodi Rell and the state in 2005. Following a motion by state officials, Hartford Superior Court Judge Joseph Shortall set aside three of the four complaints in the lawsuit, and ruled that schoolchildren had no right to “suitable educational opportunities” under the Connecticut Constitution.

CCJEF then successfully petitioned the Supreme Court for an expedited appeal.

Read the entire Connecticut Law Tribune story by Christian Nolan