A blind former Wilson High School student is suing Long Beach Unified, alleging he was not given the proper materials to learn on an equal basis with other students.
Carlos Lopez filed the lawsuit Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court, alleging civil rights violations. His suit seeks unspecified damages.
“This type of treatment by the Long Beach Unified School District made Mr. Lopez feel like a second-class citizen,” the suit states.
An LBUSD spokesman did not immediately reply to an email seeking comment.
According to the lawsuit, Lopez, 19, attended Wilson High from 2011-15. He requested classroom accommodations that included assistive technology and alternate format materials, the suit states. The district acknowledged that learning materials should have been given to Lopez in an electronic format or in Braille, the suit states.
“However, the district failed to provide these accommodations in a timely and complete fashion and, in some instances, failed to provide them at all,” the suit alleges.
As a result, Lopez struggled to keep up academically with his fellow students and also suffered from anxiety and depression, according to the complaint.
“These denials also affected Mr. Lopez’s grades and impeded his ability to access the same material as his classmates,” the suit states.
In his freshman year, Lopez did not receive his textbooks in Braille until weeks and sometimes months after the beginning of each semester, the suit states. He was not given a copy of his biology workbook in Braille, forcing his parents to have to dictate the pages assigned for homework, the suit states.
Because only the final exam was in Braille, he had to take other tests orally with a teacher’s aide, according to the lawsuit.
Lopez took algebra quizzes and tests after school during his sophomore year because they were not put in Braille in a timely manner, the suit states.
Lopez was provided with an electronic version of his history book in his junior year, but it was a newer edition than other students had, the suit states.
“As a result, the pages and sections were different and the information was not the same,” the suit states.
Lopez ultimately had to drop the class, the suit states.
In his senior year, Lopez did not receive all the materials he needed for his expository reading and writing class, the suit states. He also was not given a copy of a textbook needed for his health class, according to the lawsuit.
Lopez repeatedly told the district he believed he was being discriminated against and he filed a claim against the LBUSD in April, the suit states. The district accepted his claim regarding events occurring no further back than April 2014, one year before the claim was filed, the suit states.
Lopez now attends Cal State Long Beach.
—City News Service