Michael Gregory

The Kentucky Supreme Court’s decision in the Rose v. Council for Better Education has guided education policy for decades – but has it been successful?…

For years, Larry Nassar sexually abused female athletes under the guise of medical treatment while serving as the doctor for USA Gymnastics...If someone like Nassar were abusing children in Massachusetts, officials at a private athletic organization or a higher education institution would not be required under the state’s mandated reporter law to report him to the Department of Children and Families – because they are not considered “mandated reporters.” ... A 2018 report by a legislative committee recommended the state update its mandated reporter law to fix what it called a “glaring loophole” that puts youth athletes at higher risk for abuse...Michael Gregory, who teaches education law at Harvard Law School and is managing attorney at the Trauma and Learning Policy Initiative, which helps traumatized children succeed in school, said the proposed changes represent “a sweeping expansion” of the mandated reporter law. He worries that the law could “become a major source of surveillance” if, for example, a television repair person entering a home becomes a mandated reporter. “The more people you have participating in that surveillance, the greater the likelihood that racial disproportionality will increase, particularly when it’s non-professionals, those not trained in working with children, who would be rendering reports to DCF,” Gregory said.  Gregory also voiced concerns about removing the poverty and disability exemptions from the definition of neglect. “Nobody’s saying that families experiencing poverty, or where disability is a factor, shouldn’t be entitled to lots of support. They should,” he said. “But whether an agency that can take your children away from you is the place they should be getting support is another question.”

1L January Experiential Term courses focus on skills-building, collaboration and self-reflection

Roughly two dozen Harvard Law School professors have signed a New York Times editorial arguing that the United States Senate should not confirm Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. Harvard affiliates — including former Law School Dean Martha L. Minow and Laurence Tribe — joined more than 1,000 law professors across the country in signing the editorial, published online Wednesday. The professors wrote that Kavanaugh displayed a lack of “impartiality and judicial temperament requisite to sit on the highest court of our land” in the heated testimony he gave during a nationally televised hearing held Sept. 27 in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee....As of late Wednesday, the letter had been signed by the following: Sabi Ardalan, Christopher T. Bavitz, Elizabeth Bartholet, Christine Desan, Susan H. Farbstein, Nancy Gertner, Robert Greenwald, Michael Gregory, Janet Halley, Jon Hanson, Adriaan Lanni, Bruce H. Mann, Frank Michelman, Martha Minow, Robert H. Mnookin, Intisar Rabb, Daphna Renan, David L. Shapiro, Joseph William Singer, Carol S. Steiker, Matthew C. Stephenson, Laurence Tribe, Lucie White, Alex Whiting, Jonathan Zittrain

Violence children see at home can affect their chances for success in school and later in life. That's why the Trauma and Learning Policy Initiative, based at Harvard Law School in Massachusetts, advocates for trauma-sensitive schools to help children impacted by trauma to feel safe at school. There are six attributes of a trauma sensitive school that are explained in the initiative's book, "Helping Traumatized Children Learn II: Creating and Advocating for Trauma Sensitive Schools." Those attributes came from work done in schools in Brockton, Mass., and other places, and describe what a trauma sensitive school looks and feels like, said Michael Gregory, a senior attorney with the initiative and a clinical professor of law at Harvard Law School.