436
Scalia, J., concurring in judgment
instructional dynamics in classrooms throughout the country. The Congress is not likely to have mandated this result, and we do not interpret the statute to require it.
For these reasons, even assuming a teacher's grade book is an education record, the Court of Appeals erred, for in all events the grades on students' papers would not be covered under FERPA at least until the teacher has collected them and recorded them in his or her grade book. We limit our holding to this narrow point, and do not decide the broader question whether the grades on individual student assignments, once they are turned in to teachers, are protected by the Act.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Justice Scalia, concurring in the judgment.
I agree with the Court that peer-graded student papers do not constitute "education records" while they remain in the possession of the peer grader because, as the Court explains, a student who grades another's work is not "a person acting for" the school in the ordinary meaning of that phrase. Ante, at 432, 433. I cannot agree, however, with the other ground repeatedly suggested by the Court: that education records include only documents kept in some central repository at the school. Ante, at 433 ("The word 'maintain' suggests FERPA records will be kept in a filing cabinet in a records room at the school or on a permanent secure database . . . . It is fanciful to say [student graders] maintain the papers in the same way the registrar maintains a student's folder in a permanent file"), 435 ("FERPA implies that education records are institutional records kept by a single central custodian, such as a registrar . . .").
As the Court acknowledges, ante, at 429, 432, Congress expressly excluded from the coverage of FERPA "records of
Page: Index Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007