Last Updated on January 16, 2025 by Michelle Ball
By Michelle Ball, Sacramento California Expulsion, Special Education, sports/CIF, College, Education and School Attorney/Lawyer for Students since 1995
Has a student you love been harassed by a school staff member, punished unfairly, bullied by security, or is a someone on campus treating you, the parent, poorly? You may want to file a personnel complaint.
What is a Personnel Complaint?
A personnel complaint is a written document that outlines rule breaches, wrongs, and malicious acts by school staff members. The complaint will usually describe a situation involving a student or parent, which is ongoing and/or occurred semi-recently.
These complaints are filed usually when a parent has exhausted other attempts to resolve a bad situation on campus with the staff involved or otherwise. Personnel complaints are filed for resolution, and to ensure a situation gets memorialized in a staff member’s employment records.
How Do I File a School Personnel Complaint?
School districts have policies related to filing personnel complaints, which a parent should locate. Usually the policy can be found by a search of the school district website. It should also be in school board policies, where parents can search for sections involving school personnel or students.
A parent can also call the school district and ask them to send the personnel complaint forms and policies.
What Are the Steps of a School Personnel Complaint?
Steps to file a personnel complaint usually involve:
- Parent discussing the matter with the staff (e.g. teacher) involved and trying to resolve it.
- Parent submitting a written personnel complaint.
- Meeting with the school Principal or other required school administrator to see if the situation can be fixed.
- Meeting with a District representative if the matter still is not resolved.
- Board meeting to review, IF the Board chooses to review it.
Here is an example of one school district’s personnel complaint policy.
During the process, at the different levels, communications may issue indicating if the parent’s allegations were “founded” or “unfounded.” There may also be, for any founded allegations, items listed that will be done to rectify the problems that were verified.
Where Does the Personnel Complaint End?
At lower levels of the personnel complaint process, if a parent does not like the answers they get, they can move to the next complaint level (if any remain).
School personnel complaints have their final end either at the school district or school board levels (if the school board chooses to hear the complaint). There is typically no administrative appeal beyond these levels (such as to the California Department of Education- CDE) as the District controls hiring, firing, and decisions about personnel, not the CDE.
What If I Don’t Like the Final Answer I Get?
Personnel complaints can have good outcomes, be validated and allegations can be “founded.”
If a bad outcome issues, and the teacher or school staff member allegations are “unfounded,” a parent should not give up. Parents can continue to document new issues and advocate to resolve them.
School or District Staff Don’t Want to Find Wrongs of Other Staff
It should not be surprising to parents that sometimes schools don’t want to document wrongs about their fellow personnel. Instead, the investigators may protect teachers, school office staff or other staff members during the investigation process. Parents should still go in with an open mind expecting good faith actors, as there are some in school districts.
However, school staff often circle the wagon to protect each other.
Regardless, filing complaints is important to try to stop bad actors from continuing. The more parents complain and document matters, the more likely the school district can fire the staff member, eventually…
Michelle Ball is a student lawyer who has assisted families with educational troubles since 1995. As an attorney in the education field, she has helped students file personnel and other complaints documenting wrongs by school staff members, to try to effect change. Located in Sacramento, California, she assists across the Golden State in Monterey, Vacaville, Lincoln, Tahoe, Modesto and many other locales.
