NYS statutes in Lexis Nexis Academic

FAQ "How do I find NYS statutes...you know, from the McKinney's Black Books, AKA the Consolidated Laws of New York State, in Lexis Nexis Academic?"

A: Once you sign into LNA, select US LEGAL, then
State Statutes, Codes & Regulations. Choose New York from the search box menu, then....

If you have a specific citation, preface the section number with "NY CLS [the law heading] sec. [the number]"

Seem complicated? It's not, really. Example: if you're looking for "education law 3020-a" type in -- with the quotes: "ny cls educ. sec. 3020-a"

Looking for Mental Hygiene Law section 9.09? Type in NY CLS Men Hyg § 9.09.

If you do a keyword search instead, you an limit results to NYS laws (as opposed to the NYCRR regulations) by clicking "Statutory Codes" to the left of the results.

NYCRR is In LEXIS NEXIS!!

You can now find the New York Codes, rules & Regulations in Lexis Nexis Academic! Oce you're signed in to LNA:
Go to US LEGAL, and Choose
State Statutes, Codes & Regulations, then choose New York
To search by citation, type "8 nycrr sec. [the section and subsection]"
EXAMPLE (yes, with quotes): "8 nycrr sec. 80- 1.3"
THEN: click all the Source boxes (administrative codes, statutory codes, etc.)

YOU can also search by Keyword! From your results -- which should include NYS statutes as well as regulations -- click "Regulatory codes" from the left-side menu. Voila! NYCRR regulations!

Supreme Court Dockets Or What Is That Number?

A student writes "I need to find this Supreme Court case...I was given the names of the parties and a number with a dash in the middle. What is that number, and how do I find the decision?"

The number is a Supreme Court Docket Number, the first part of which is the year the case was placed on the docket with the Court, and the second is essentially the case number. It's a case number, not a decision number, really. In principle, it is possible for decisions to be rendered in a different sequence than their docket numbers.

This SCOTUS site explains docket numbers and lets you search for case names and decisions by docket numbers, too.

What to do in Lexis Nexis: the best thing to do is to look by the parties e.g., Locke v. Karass, rather than trying to search them with the docket number (07-610) too.

The only way I'm aware of to search by docket number in Lexis Nexis Academic is to do a US Federal & State Cases search and look for the docket number as a keyword. Limit your search to the court (e.g., US Supreme Court) to avoid a lot of noise. Not nearly as efficient as searching by citation or parties, but it can be done!

Just for fun, try in the SCOTUS Docket Search, then in Google, then in LexisNexis...

• Fitzgerald v. Barnstable 07-1125
• Locke v. Karass 07-610
  

Anyone near Otsego County have Education Department Reports?

According to the SUNY Union Catalog, SUNY's Oneonta and Binghamton have the Judicial Decisions of the Commissioner of Education.

Supreme Court Docket?

A student asks "How do I find out what cases are about to appear before the US Supreme Court, or other courts?"

Good Question. You know that only decisions (not motions or calendars or court dockets) are in Lexis Nexis Academic. And not every court has an updated, online calendar (in some cases, a rip to the local county courthouse is the only way to go.) But here is a short list of tools you might find useful.

• The Supreme Court Docket is the SCOTUS official tracking system. You can search by keywords that might appear in the filing (e.g., "education" "school") but there is no subject access. So try different words. And notice that some of the filings have already been decided!
• The NYS Unified Court System's eCourts tool lets you view pending cases in the NYS legal system.
• Justia's docket search tool enables you to search for pending FEDERAL cases that are being heard in NYS and elsewhere. NOTE: At this time, you can only search by party names (e.g., "school district" as a litigant)
• the Southern District of NY (federal) PACER search: register (free) and search the court calendar and more

Practice ed Law Research Paper

Let's start with an interesting article in the NEA Today. Mary Ellen Flannery, "Address Unknown:
How do you assign homework to a kid without a home?" The article talks about homeless students, and, among other things, school districts and residency. It also mentions the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, known also as the "McKinney Act."

1. Let's Google the Act. We know that the word "Act" should indicate a federal statutory law. Turns out it was originally PL 100-77, and Reauthorized as part of NCLB, as PL107-110, 115 STAT 1989
2. Let's look in the index of our School Law textbook to find if the Act is mentioned and how it's been applied. Turns out, there's a section of the text devoted to homeless education. Fortunate you!
3. You wonder if there are other books that discuss Mckinney-Vento. So you click into the Reference Universe database and search the whole Reference Collection in one search!
   
4. Now that you have the law text and some examples, you should look at what kinds of matters related to homelessness may have been adjudicated by the NYSED Commissioner of Education. You also decide to search the Commissioner's Decisions for "residence"
5. Looks like the School Law textbook mentions some 8 NYCRR regulations and some NYS statutes. Good thing they're online!
   
6. However, because Mckinney-Vento is a federal law, you need to search for court cases, too. Lexis Nexis to the rescue! A Federal & State Cases search on "Mckinney act" should get us started. Too many results? Add words like Children or school or district. Or all of them.
7. That librarian is so cool! You think as you write the paper. Everyone should know a cool librarian.
   

Select cases to practice

• Forest Grove School dist v. T.A. (Special education)557 U.S. ___ (2009), 129 S.Ct. 2484
  
• Safford Unified School District v. Redding (Search & Seizure) 557 U.S. ___ (2009), 129 S.Ct. 2633
• Morse v. Frederick (Freedom of Speech) 551 U.S. 393