Court rules teachers’ data isn’t protected

The Colorado Court of Appeals on Thursday concluded that JeffersonCounty teachers’ sick- leave records don’t qualify as personnel files and are subject to examination under the state’s open records act.

The ruling affirms a lower court ruling and stems from the fall of 2014, when awave of teacher absences forced the closure of several JeffersonCounty schools at a time when students were conducting walkouts in protest of district policy proposals.

A Jefferson County parent requested the names of teachers who had called in sick during the protests and the teachers union challenged the request in court, claiming that personnel records are confidential.

But theappeals court in the Thursday ruling concluded that the records in the case are not confidential because “a teacher’s absence is directly related to the teacher’s job as a public employee.”

“Sick leave records that do not otherwise contain information that should be kept confidential, such as descriptions of specific medical conditions, are not protected from disclosure,” the judges wrote.

A number of media outlets, including The Denver Post, along with theColorado Freedom of Information Coalition filed a friend- ofthecourt brief requesting a release of the sick- leave records.

But any release of names will probably be delayed by appeals.