When a North Carolina juvenile is committed to the Division of Youth Services and DYS is teaching them in a detention center or training school, can the juvenile's prior local school district refuse to send DYS the student's education records, citing FERPA?
Plain-English summary
The Division of Youth Services (DYS), part of North Carolina's Department of Human Resources, ran detention centers and training schools for juveniles committed to its custody. DYS had its own schools inside those facilities, and it was statutorily required to educate the committed juveniles, since they could not attend public schools while in custody. To do that job well, DYS needed each juvenile's prior school records. Some local school districts were declining to send records to DYS, citing federal FERPA confidentiality concerns. DHR Secretary C. Robin Britt asked the AG to settle whether local schools could and should hand the records over.
The AG, signed by Attorney General Michael F. Easley and Senior Deputy AG Edwin M. Speas, Jr., concluded yes on both fronts: the schools could and should send the records, and once DYS had the records, it had to maintain the same confidentiality the public schools did.
The federal statute was the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, 20 U.S.C. § 1232g. FERPA generally protects education-record confidentiality, but it expressly permits an "educational agency or institution to disclose education records to officials of other schools or school systems in which the student seeks or intends to enroll," subject to a parental-notice condition (the parents must be told the records have been transferred, must get a copy on request, and have an opportunity for a hearing to challenge content). 20 U.S.C. § 1232g(b)(1)(B). The federal regulation is 34 C.F.R. § 99.34.
The structural question was whether DYS schools were "other schools" in the FERPA sense. G.S. § 115C-110(a) supplied the answer for special-needs students: when DHR or the Department of Correction provides education to children with special needs, "all duties, responsibilities, rights and privileges imposed on or granted to local school administration units are also imposed on or granted to" DHR and DOC and their divisions. That made DYS the functional equivalent of a local school administrative unit, at least for special-needs juveniles. The General Statutes' 30-day records-transfer rule, G.S. § 115C-403(b), required prior schools to provide records to the new school within 30 days.
What about committed juveniles who were not classified as having special needs? The AG read the broader statutory scheme as embodying the same legislative intent. Public agencies providing education to school-age children, including DYS facilities, should be able to exchange records when a child moves or is moved between them. The AG did not rest the answer for non-special-needs juveniles on a single statute, but on the combined effect of FERPA, the school-records-transfer regime, and the AG-described legislative purpose.
The opinion's federal authority was Alexander S. v. Boyd, 876 F. Supp. 773 (D.S.C. 1995), in which South Carolina school districts had refused to disclose records to the South Carolina Juvenile Justice Department on FERPA grounds. The U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, weighed in with an interpretive memorandum confirming that FERPA's transfer-school exception applied to juvenile-justice education agencies. The federal district court adopted that interpretation. The North Carolina AG followed suit.
After DYS receives the records, it inherits the FERPA obligation. DYS can only release the records (whether obtained from a prior school or generated during the juvenile's DYS schooling) as FERPA permits. That parallel confidentiality duty was important to the opinion's reasoning: schools were not handing records to a less-protective agency. DYS would be bound by the same federal privacy framework.
Currency note
This opinion was issued in 1995. Subsequent statutory amendments, court decisions, or later AG opinions may have changed the analysis. Treat this page as historical context, not current legal advice. Verify current law before relying on any specific rule, deadline, or remedy mentioned here. The Division of Youth Services has been reorganized multiple times since 1995 (now part of the Division of Adult Correction and Juvenile Justice, after various transfers between DHR and DPS). The Juvenile Code in Chapter 7A has been recodified as Chapter 7B (1998-1999). FERPA has been amended several times and the implementing regulations have evolved. Schools and juvenile-justice agencies handling a current records-transfer question should verify the current statute and regulation references, and the current name of the receiving agency, but the principle that committed juveniles' prior school records may flow to the juvenile-justice education unit under FERPA's transfer-school exception has continued.
Background and statutory framework
The educational continuity question for committed juveniles is a recurring legal problem. Juveniles in detention or training schools cannot attend their home public schools, but they remain school-age and entitled to education. State statutes typically require the detention or correctional agency to provide schooling within the facility. To do that well, the receiving educational program needs the juvenile's prior records: IEPs for special-needs students, transcripts, behavioral records, academic assessments, attendance.
Without that information, the receiving program is starting from zero on each new commitment. With the records, the program can place the student at the right level, identify special-education entitlements, build on prior coursework, and avoid duplicating remediation. The records-transfer rule is the operational backbone of educational continuity.
FERPA was passed in 1974 to give parents and eligible students rights of access to and control over education records. The general rule is that schools cannot release records to third parties without parental consent. The transfer-school exception in subsection (b)(1)(B) lets schools share records when a student moves between schools, with a parental-notice requirement. The exception is designed to support educational continuity; it would be perverse to read it narrowly enough to block the very kind of transfer it was meant to facilitate.
Alexander S. v. Boyd came down at almost the same time as the AG opinion (early 1995) and provided a clean federal precedent. The South Carolina case involved a class action by juveniles in the state's training schools alleging inadequate education and other deprivations. The records-disclosure issue was a sub-issue, and the federal court's resolution, with Civil Rights Division input, gave the AG a ready-made federal interpretation to anchor the North Carolina answer.
The opinion's confidentiality holding was structurally important. If DYS had been treated as a non-school third party with no FERPA obligation, the school's records-disclosure would have been a one-way release into a less-protected environment. By framing DYS as a FERPA-bound school equivalent, the AG preserved the privacy framework across the transfer.
Common questions
Does the school have to notify the parent before sending records to DYS?
FERPA conditions the transfer-school disclosure on parental notification (after the fact is acceptable under the regulation, but the parent must be told the records were transferred, get copies on request, and have a hearing right to challenge content). The AG opinion did not break new ground on the notice mechanics; it preserved them.
Can the parent stop the transfer by objecting?
FERPA's transfer-school exception does not require parental consent for the actual transfer; the parent has a notice right and a hearing right to challenge the record's content, but not a veto on the transfer to the new school. So the parent's objection cannot block the records from getting to DYS.
What about a juvenile in a private boarding school who gets committed to DYS?
The same analysis would apply if the private school is subject to FERPA (most are, if they receive federal education funding). The AG opinion did not address private schools specifically, but the federal statute treats public and private FERPA-covered schools the same on the transfer issue.
After release, can DYS share the records with probation officers or DSS?
FERPA limits further disclosure by the receiving agency. DYS would have to find a separate FERPA exception (court order, parental consent, etc.) to share with non-education actors. The AG opinion was about getting records into DYS, not about sharing them out.
Source
Citations
- 20 U.S.C. § 1232g (FERPA)
- 34 C.F.R. § 99.34
- G.S. §§ 7A-517(15), 7A-573, 7A-574, 7A-611, 7A-652
- G.S. §§ 115C-109, 115C-110(a), 115C-114(a), 115C-378, 115C-403(b)
- G.S. §§ 134A-2(8), 134A-20
- Alexander S. v. Boyd, 876 F. Supp. 773 (D.S.C. 1995)
Original opinion text
DATE: July 24, 1995
SUBJECT: Chapters 7A, 115C and 134A of The North Carolina General Statutes; 20 U.S.C. § 1232, Family Educational Rights And Privacy Act; Release of Juvenile Education Records To The Division Of Youth Services, Department of Human Resources
REQUESTED BY: C. Robin Britt, Sr., Secretary, North Carolina Department of Human Resources
QUESTIONS: Are Local School Boards Required, Upon Request, To Transmit To The Division Of Youth Services, Department Of Human Resources, Education Records Of Juveniles Committed To The Physical Custody Of The Division of Youth Services?
If Local School Boards Are Required To Transmit Education Records To The Division Of Youth Services, Is The Division Of Youth Services Bound to Keep Such Records Confidential?
CONCLUSION: The Answer To Each Question Is Yes.
DISCUSSION:
The Division of Youth Services ("DYS"), North Carolina Department of Human Resources ("DHR"), operates regional detention centers for juveniles ordered into secure custody by the juvenile court or bound over for trial as adults in superior court and residential training schools for juveniles who have been adjudicated delinquent. G.S. §§ 7A-517(15); 7A-574; 7A-611. DYS operates schools in each of its regional juvenile detention centers and training schools. G.S. §§ 7A-652(a); 134A-2(8).
Juveniles involuntarily ordered into secure detention or adjudicated delinquent and ordered to training school are in the physical custody of DYS. G.S. §§ 7A-573; 7A-652(g). DYS is required by statute to develop educational programs and services for juveniles in its physical custody inasmuch as the terms of juvenile commitments prohibit them from attending public schools. G.S. §§ 115C-378; 134A-20.
Educational records maintained by public schools previously attended by juveniles in DYS custody are often helpful to DYS in fulfilling its duty to provide educational programs and services. Public schools, however, are sometimes reluctant to share those educational records with DYS because of uncertainty about the scope of various laws generally protecting the confidentiality of such records and their authority to do so. To resolve these uncertainties, you have asked for our opinion.
After carefully examining the laws pertinent to this issue we have concluded that public schools can and should provide DYS with the educational records of juveniles in DYS custody for whom DYS has educational responsibilities. We have also concluded that DYS is bound to maintain the confidentiality of those records in the same manner as a public school once it obtains them. These conclusions apply to all DHR facilities that provide educational programs and services for children of school age.
Many, if not most, children of school age in DYS or other DHR facilities have been identified, or may properly be identified, as children with "special needs" within the meaning of G.S. § 115C-109 and similar federal legislation. In regard to the education of children with "special needs," the General Assembly has stated that "all duties, responsibilities, rights and privileges imposed on or granted to local school administration units are also imposed on or granted to the Department of Human Resources and Department of Correction and their divisions and agencies." G.S. § 115C-110(a). The effect of this statutory provision is to make the various divisions and agencies of DHR engaged in providing educational opportunities to school age children with "special needs" the functional equivalent of a local school administrative unit. One of the obligations imposed on local school administration units is promptly to provide a child's educational records to another school system to which the student has been transferred. G.S. § 115C-403(b) (school system to which child transfers must be obtained by the "receiving" system from the other system within 30 days). While this obligation arguably does not apply when the child in DYS custody has not been classified as a child with "special needs," it is our opinion that the foregoing statutes represent and embody an intention by the General Assembly that public agencies providing education to school age children share the educational records of children who move or are moved from one of those agencies to another.
Confidentiality requirements generally applicable to education records do not prevent this exchange of records between a public school and DYS or other DHR agencies or divisions providing educational services to school age children. The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act ("FERPA"), 20 U.S.C. §§ 1232 et seq., applies to the educational records of all public school students and generally protects the confidentiality of education records. See also G.S. § 115C-114(a). FERPA, however, authorizes an educational agency or institution to disclose education records to "… officials of other schools or school systems in which the student seeks or intends to enroll, upon the condition that the student's parents be notified of the transfer, receive a copy of the record if desired, and have an opportunity for a hearing to challenge the content of the record." 20 U.S.C. § 1232g(b)(B).
In Alexander S., 876 F.Supp. 773, 800-803 (D.S.C. 1995), evidence was presented showing that some South Carolina School Districts were refusing to disclose education records to the South Carolina Juvenile Justice Department (the South Carolina counterpart to DYS) believing that such disclosure was prohibited by FERPA. The district Court sought and received an interpretative memorandum from the United States Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, concluding that the provisions of 20 U.S.C. § 1232g(b)(1) (B) permit the disclosure. "The only obligations upon transferor school districts are the obligations to provide reasonable notice to the parent that the student's records have been transferred and, if requested, to provide copies of the records that have been sent." Id. at 802. See also 34 C.F.R. § 99.34. Once DYS obtains these education records it is itself bound to honor FERPA and release the education records it has obtained and generated only as authorized by that law.
In summary, local school boards can and should transmit to DYS and other DHR agencies providing educational services to school age children any requested education records of juveniles committed to their custody or control. Once such education records are obtained by DYS or other DHR facilities they are confidential and must not be released except as permitted by FERPA.
Michael F. Easley ATTORNEY GENERAL
Edwin M. Speas, Jr.
Senior Deputy Attorney General
John R. Corne
Special Deputy Attorney General