University of Wisconsin-Madison education law professor Suzanne Eckes said that, ultimately, schools are responsible for maintaining a safe environment for their students.
When she’s teaching the basics of education law and liability, she often uses scenarios from physical education classes.
Just because there’s a student injury doesn’t mean that a school district is negligent, Eckes said. First, an injury has to occur in a situation where a teacher has a duty to supervise. Then, the teacher or instructor would have to breach that duty by, for example, “leaving a pool unattended while students were swimming, playing on their phone during class, talking with teacher friends instead of supervising the playground during recess,” she said.