If My Child Is Injured At School, Can I Sue The School?

The schools of New Orleans have the difficult task of not only educating thousands of children, but also attempting to maintain an environment that is safe for all students. While there is no absolute bar to suing a school when its employees fail in their duty to properly supervise students and provide a safe environment, any matter involving an injury at a school should be evaluated by an experienced personal injury attorney to determine its merits.

Schools do have a duty to provide reasonable supervision over students through their employees. They are not, however, expected to be perfect in their supervision of students. The Louisiana courts have noted that constant supervision of all students is neither possible nor required, and that the degree of supervision required must be evaluated based on the specific circumstances of the particular case.

As a result, any time a lawsuit against the school is being considered, several factors must be carefully evaluated. These include not only whether the school was providing supervision, but also what sort of activity led to the injury, whether the possibility of injury could have been reasonably foreseen by the school employees, and the capacity of a student of a given age to understand the risk of injury.

Whether the school could actually be considered to be in control of the student at the time of the injury is also critical to any lawsuit involving a school. While a school will generally be considered to have custody of a student when in class or on the school bus, they may not have a legal requirement to provide supervision during certain extracurricular activities or for students walking to or from school.

An experienced personal injury attorney will carefully scrutinize all of the factors surrounding an injury when determining whether the school is a proper party to proceed against. Even if compensation cannot be sought from the school, there may be other parties who could be held responsible for the child’s injury.

If your child has suffered an injury and you have any questions regarding your legal rights, we would be happy to take your call. We can be reached at (504) 527-8767.