Injuries at school are a common occurrence for young children. Parents of children who were injured at school may face costly medical bills and rehabilitation costs. When a child is injured at school, it is sometimes possible for parents to sue the school for damages related to the child’s injury. Because a public school is a government entity, filing a claim is different from suing a business or a person for negligence. Appropriate steps must be taken before the parents can sue the school directly.

School districts are immune from liability under a doctrine known as “sovereign immunity.” This means that school officials and the school itself cannot be held liable for injuries that occur on school grounds. The good news is that all states have waived this immunity in cases where the school or one of its employees was negligent and the negligence caused an injury.

Parents who want to sue a school for their child’s injuries must proceed according to state requirements. They usually must file a “Notice of Claim” with the appropriate state agency prior to filing a lawsuit directly against the school. The notice of claim must usually be in writing, describe the nature of the claim and include a demand for compensation including a dollar amount so that the incident can be investigated. The notice must be filed within a time frame specified by state law, usually a much shorter time than that allowed for filing a lawsuit. Failure to do so may result in the claim being time-barred.

In California, parents have six months from the time of the alleged injury to file a Notice of Claim. A personal injury lawyer Los Angeles CA may be able to assist parents with this type of case. If the claim is rejected by the state agency, a child injury lawyer may be able to assist parents file a claim in state courts.

After the claim is filed, an investigation will typically be conducted. A personal injury lawyer will be granted access to any relevant information about the incident requested, such as witness statements, photographs, camera footage and incident reports. Even if the injury was caused by another child, the parents of an injured child may be able to claim that school officials failed to properly supervise children which contributed to the incident that caused the injury. Other types of cases may involve unsafe or improperly maintained equipment such as cracked sidewalks and playground equipment that has not been properly secured.