Can I Get a Mistake in My Teen's Discipline Record Fixed?

Often yes, if what is wrong is a fact. FERPA, the federal student privacy law, lets you ask the school to amend a record that is inaccurate, misleading, or in violation of your child’s privacy, and gives you a hearing if the school says no. It does not let you overturn the discipline itself.

That second point is where most of the disappointment lives, so it comes first below.

What can I ask the school to change?

The rule is 34 CFR 99.20(a):

“If a parent or eligible student believes the education records relating to the student contain information that is inaccurate, misleading, or in violation of the student’s rights of privacy, he or she may ask the educational agency or institution to amend the record.”

The Department of Education’s Student Privacy Policy Office draws the limit in A Parent Guide to FERPA, issued in July 2021. A parent has “the right to seek to amend non-substantive factual errors,” but “a school is not required by FERPA to afford a parent the right to seek to change substantive decisions made by school officials.” Its examples include grades, other evaluations of a student, and “disciplinary decisions.”

In practice that splits a discipline file into two kinds of entry. A wrong date, the wrong room, a classmate’s name in place of your child’s, or a note that says out-of-school suspension when it was in-school: those are factual. The finding that your child broke a rule, and the consequence the school chose, are decisions. The guide does not draw the line more precisely than that, and I would not pretend it does. If you are unsure which side an entry falls on, ask anyway and let the school say which it thinks it is.

To challenge the decision, the place to look is your district’s own discipline appeal process. That is set locally, not by FERPA. The questions to ask the school checklist covers how to find it.

How do I ask?

In writing, after you have seen the record. You have a separate right to inspect it, set out on seeing the video of the fight.

Under 34 CFR 99.7, every school covered by FERPA must notify parents each year of their rights, and the notice must include “the procedure for requesting amendment of records.” It is often in the student handbook or on the district website. Follow that procedure if there is one.

A request can be short. Name the record, quote the entry, say what is wrong and what it should say:

I am asking the school to amend my child’s education record under FERPA, 34 CFR 99.20. The discipline entry dated [date] says [quoted text]. That is inaccurate because [reason]. It should read [correction]. Please tell me your decision in writing.

FERPA reaches schools that receive funds under a U.S. Department of Education program, according to 34 CFR 99.1. Most public schools do. A private school may not, so ask it first.

What does the school have to do?

Under 34 CFR 99.20, it must decide “within a reasonable time.” If it decides not to amend the record, it must tell you so, and tell you of your right to a hearing. It does not have to agree with you. The parent guide is plain that a school “is not required to amend an education record in accordance with a parent’s request,” only to consider it.

No federal deadline in days applies to any of these steps. “Reasonable time” is the whole rule.

What happens at the hearing?

34 CFR 99.22 sets the minimum. The school must:

• hold it within a reasonable time of your request, and give you the date, time and place reasonably in advance
• have it run by someone “who does not have a direct interest in the outcome,” which can be a school official
• give you “a full and fair opportunity to present evidence”
• decide in writing, based “solely on the evidence presented at the hearing,” with a summary of the evidence and the reasons

You may be assisted or represented by people of your choice, including an attorney, at your own expense. The Department confirms that in its FAQ on attorneys at amendment hearings.

Bring the evidence that the entry is wrong: an attendance record, a dated email, the letter that was sent home. The hearing is about the content of the record, so keep to that.

What if they still say no?

You can write your side into the file. Under 34 CFR 99.21, if the school decides after the hearing that the record is not inaccurate or misleading, it must tell you of your right to place a statement in the record “commenting on the contested information” or saying why you disagree, or both.

The school must then keep that statement with the contested part of the record for as long as it keeps the record, and include it whenever it discloses that part. For a discipline entry that may be sent on to another school, that last rule is the useful one.

If the record has already gone to a school your child is enrolling in, 34 CFR 99.34 says the sending school must give you a copy of what it sent if you ask, and an opportunity for a hearing if you ask.

If you believe the school did not follow the rules at all, for example it never answered, you can file a written complaint with the Student Privacy Policy Office. Under 34 CFR 99.64, a complaint is timely within 180 days of the alleged violation, or of when you knew or reasonably should have known of it.

Does any of this change at 18?

Yes. The parent guide says that when a student turns 18, or attends a college or other postsecondary institution at any age, all FERPA rights move from the parent to the student. From then on the request is theirs to make.

If your teenager has an IEP, the same guide says FERPA can fix a non-substantive factual error in it, but disagreements about the IEP’s content or the placement go through the special education law’s own dispute resolution procedures.

What did this look like for one family?

Thaddeus is sixteen. When his father read the discipline file after a lunchroom argument, it listed a second incident in March that Thaddeus said had never happened. The name on the entry was a different student with the same surname.

His father emailed the request using the district’s procedure, quoting the March entry and attaching the attendance record showing Thaddeus was absent that day. The school agreed and took the entry out. It declined to change the lunchroom finding, which his father had also mentioned, and told him that one was a disciplinary decision.

This example is illustrative rather than a real family. The point is the split: facts go through FERPA, and the decision goes through the district’s appeal.

What this page cannot tell you

Federal law sets a floor. Your district may have its own forms, timetable and appeal routes, and your state may have rules on how long discipline records are kept, which this page does not cover. Does a suspension follow them? covers what is known about that.

This page is general information and not legal advice. If a record is likely to matter in an expulsion, a court case or an admissions decision, that is the point to speak to a lawyer licensed where you live.