PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — The Rhode Island Department of Education has ruled that the superintendent of North Kingstown schools could not bar two students from attending in-person classes because they went to school while their father awaited the results of a coronavirus test.
The siblings, one in high school and one in middle school, were suspended last month by their respective principals from attending in-person classes for the rest of the school year. The family appealed, and Superintendent Philip Auger reduced the suspension until Feb. 12.
The parents went to the American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island, which petitioned the Department of Education, which ruled in the family’s favor on Tuesday.
For privacy reasons, the family was not publicly identified.
State Education Commissioner Angelica Infante-Green, quoting Greek playwright Euripides, wrote in her decision that “it is time, and past time to discredit and repudiate the notion that the sins of the father should be visited upon hapless offspring.”
The father eventually tested positive, as did the children, who were then taken out of school immediately.
Auger said 44 other students had to be quarantined because the two students went to class sick and defended the suspensions.
“This was a flagrant disregard for the rules,” he told The Providence Journal.
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