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Education Law

This guide will help you locate resources on education law and focuses on education law-specific resources. Prepared for Professor Lukasik’s Education Law Class, Spring Semester 2022.

General Information

Federal primary sources include statutes, caselaw, and administrative rules and regulations. Legislative histories can also assist you in determining the legislative intent behind a law. To learn more about these sources, including where to find them in the law library, select a tab below.

Legislative history is comprised of the events and documents created during the enactment of a bill. This can include documents such as earlier versions of the bill, committee reports, transcripts of floor debates, etc. You use legislative histories to try to determine legislative intent - i.e., what Congress intended the law to accomplish.

You can find federal cases on Education Law using print or online resources. Print resources include West's Education Reporter and West's Education Reporter Digest.

You can also use Westlaw Edge or Lexis+ for online caselaw searches.

  • On Westlaw Edge, use the West Key Number System to hone your search. Using Education as a topic, you can scroll through their list of subtopics, or enter your own in the search bar. Make sure that you are searching in the correct jurisdiction by checking the box at the top of the page.
  • On Lexis+, the Education Law Practice Area has a link for all Education Law cases. To find the Education Law Practice Area, select the Practice Area tab at the top, and then the Education Law link. A link for Education Law cases is at the top of the page. 

Congress often passes laws that direct executive branch agencies to implement the law through passing rules and regulations. Most regulations can be found codified under Title 34 in the Code of Federal Regulations (C.F.R.). You can browse or search the CFR in either Westlaw or LexisNexis, among other places. Like statutes, federal regulations are frequently amended, so be sure to update your research using Westlaw KeyCite or Lexis+ Shepard's.

Federal rules and regulations, as well as announcements of pending rule changes, can be found on WestlawEdge and Lexis+, but you can also find them on free government sites such as the U.S. Department of Education, the eCFR, and Regulations.gov.

Legislative history is comprised of the events and documents created during the enactment of a bill. This can include documents such as earlier versions of the bill, committee reports, transcripts of floor debates, etc. You use legislative histories to try to determine legislative intent - i.e., what Congress intended the law to accomplish. For important pieces of legislation, there are compiled legislative histories. You can find some of these Federal Legislative Histories in the HeinOnline U.S. Federal Legislative History Library.