Laura Berman

Practice Areas

Laura has practised in education law for almost 30 years. She is a Partner in Stone King’s Education Team advising state schools on a wide range of pupil-focused operational issues.

These include:

Admissions and admission appeals;

Pupil behaviour and exclusions;

Special Educational Needs, in particular in relation to schools’ responsibilities to make provision for pupils with and without an EHCP, SEN Funding, SEN related behavioural issues, responding to EHCP consultations;

Disability and other Equality Act matters; Laura regularly defends disability discrimination claims in the Special Educational Needs and Disability Tribunal;

School policies;

Parental complaints;

Safeguarding.

Laura regularly delivers training on the above matters, and in particular about exclusions and complaints.

Laura’s depth of experience enables her to help clients with contentious and non-contentious issues. She regularly defends judicial review challenges. Laura has specialist expertise in advising faith schools and also has significant experience assisting individuals with education law issues.

In addition, Laura manages and develops our Legal Support Retainer Service and oversees our retainer clients in London and the south east.

Professional Memberships

Laura is a member of the Education Law Association.

Publications

Laura has written a number of articles for the Education Law Journal.

Personal

Outside of her legal practice, Laura delivers workshops and training. She is Chair of Governors at two primary schools.

Work Highlights

Laura advised a Jewish faith school in relation to several contentious objections to the Office of the Schools Adjudicator against its admission arrangements. Each objection raised a variety of different points including complaints about the manner of and content of the consultation, conflicts of interest, and multiple alleged breaches of the School Admissions Code 2014. The response was complex not only in respect of bringing together all the various elements of the numerous objections into a coherent document, but also in addressing previous case law in relation to legitimate expectation and an important 1989 judgment in relation to catchment areas. The Adjudicator dismissed all the objections save for one.

Laura acted for a large MAT in connection with a disability discrimination claim lodged against one of their academies. The child in question had been permanently excluded from the school. The child allegedly suffered from OCD although whether this amounted to a disability within the meaning of the Equality Act was in dispute. Laura assisted the Trust in drafting a detailed response to the claim and subsequently negotiating a settlement.

In another matter Laura acted for a Trust in connection with potential judicial review proceedings. This revolved around an allegation that the Trust (an alternative provision academy) was preventing a child from reintegrating into mainstream school. There was an important point involved regarding how and when the AP academy could or should recommend a child for mainstream reintegration. A response to the letter of claim successfully prevented the proceedings from being issued.