Advancing equal rights for people with all types of disabilities nationwide.
On May 17, 2018, Disability Rights Advocates (DRA), a national nonprofit legal center, filed a federal class action lawsuit against Stanford University for violating the rights of students with mental health disabilities. Stanford routinely responds to student mental health crises by barring students from campus and evicting them from on-campus housing. DRA is bringing this […]
On February 22, 2018, Disability Rights Advocates, in partnership with Disability Rights California (“DRC”), released a 50-page report on our 6-month investigation of the treatment of youth with disabilities at the Kern County Juvenile Hall and other Kern County juvenile detention facilities. Our investigation uncovered abuse and neglect of youth with mental health and behavioral […]
Disability Rights Advocates (DRA), a non-profit law center in Berkeley, California, is investigating the hurdles that people with documented learning disabilities and ADHD face in applying for necessary accommodations in workplace, educational, and other settings. If you plan to apply for an accommodation in the future, or if you have already done so and been […]
On July 27, 2017, DRA filed a class action lawsuit against the New York City Department of Education (“DOE”), the City of New York, and DOE Chancellor Carmen Fariña, in her official capacity, alleging violations of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and other anti-discrimination laws on behalf of a class of students with disabilities […]
Disability Rights Advocates (DRA), a non-profit law center in Berkeley, California, is investigating the hurdles that people with documented learning disabilities and ADHD face in applying for necessary accommodations on high-stakes tests. Such high stakes tests include post-graduate admissions tests (MCAT, GRE, GMAT, etc.) and state licensing exams. DRA is particularly interested in high-stakes tests […]
In May 2018, Disability Rights Advocates (DRA), a non-profit law center in Berkeley, California, filed suit against Stanford University, alleging that it has discriminated against students with mental health disabilities. We continue to collect stories of students’ experiences, positive or negative, at Stanford and other colleges and universities. If you have information to share about denied […]
Disability Rights Advocates in partnership with Public Counsel filed this lawsuit because Contra Costa County Juvenile Hall had a policy and practice of locking young people with disabilities in solitary confinement for up to 23 hours a day and depriving them of education. In a video, parents of young people held at Juvenile Hall say […]
As a result of a lawsuit filed by Disability Rights Advocates (DRA), Oregon undertook extensive steps to modify its high stakes testing system to ensure that the tests do not discriminate against students with learning disabilities. The settlement is based on the findings of an expert panel that was convened by the parties to examine […]
This case received major national attention as it challenged the practice of “flagging” test scores for students with disabilities who ask for accommodations. Flagging is the practice by which administrators of standardized tests place notations on the score reports of people with disabilities who take the exams with accommodations for their disabilities. Since its implementation […]
DRA represented a class of all students in Alaska with learning disabilities who were required to take the Alaska High School Graduation Qualifying Examination (HSGQE). The parties reached a comprehensive settlement agreement on Monday, August 2, 2004. Among other critical new access features to the testing program, the settlement included a broad expansion of the […]