§ 1002.7.Enrollment Agreements

Chapter 3.7 addresses a narrow but pointed problem: enrollment paperwork that a parent signs on a child's behalf, years before any misconduct occurs, functioning later as a waiver of the child's own legal rights. The Legislature's findings in subdivision (a) call it unconscionable to require a parent, on a minor child's behalf, to waive a legal right, remedy, forum, proceeding, or procedure belonging to that child for claims arising from a criminal sexual assault or battery, as a condition of enrolling in school.

Section 1002.7(b) gives the minor a way out. A provision in a K-12 educational institution's enrollment agreement that purports to waive a legal right, remedy, forum, proceeding, or procedure can be disaffirmed by the minor — regardless of whether a parent or guardian signed on the minor's behalf — to the extent that provision would require waiving rights arising from a criminal sexual assault or criminal sexual battery committed against that minor. Disaffirming that one provision doesn't touch the rest of the enrollment agreement, which stays valid and enforceable.

The definitions in subdivision (d) keep the section tightly scoped: it covers acts that would constitute specified Penal Code sex offenses against a person under eighteen, and it applies only to public or private schools serving kindergarten through twelfth grade under a written enrollment contract.