State's Motion Denied in Georgia

Preparing the way for a trial that is scheduled to being on October 21, 2008, Superior Court Judge Elizabeth E. Long dismissed defendants’ motion for summary judgment in a decision issued on August 11, 2008. A motion for summary judgment can be granted only if the defendants had shown that there is no genuine issue of material fact to be tried and that the undisputed facts, viewed in the light most favorable to plaintiffs, warrant summary judgment as a matter of law.

Defendants had cited as their prime authority the Georgia Supreme Court’s 1981 ruling in McDaniel v. Thomas, 285 S.E.2d 156; in that case, the Court had granted a motion for summary judgment. Judge Long noted, however, that unlike plaintiffs in McDaniel, plaintiffs in the present case have raised a host of factual issues concerning deficiencies in the educational opportunities available to Georgia’s students and the state’s low high school graduation rates and low scores on national and state academic performance tests.

Implicit in the court’s decision is the fact that Georgia’s adoption of state academic standards, as well as the requirements of the federal No Child Left Behind Act, have now provided the court with specific “manageable standards” for determining whether the adequacy requirements of the state constitution have been met. Significant in this regard is that fact that the Georgia defendants could not cite any court anywhere in the country that has granted a motion for summary judgment in an adequacy case since the initiation of the national standards-based reform movement in 1989.

At trial, plaintiffs will have to present evidence to support their allegations that the basic educational opportunities offered to Georgia’s students deny many of them an adequate education and that the lack of an adequate education stems from factors that are the State’s responsibility.