A panel of judges from United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit has overturned a lower court’s decision in a case involving the Rhode Island Interscholastic League (RIIL) and a high school senior with disabilities.
The initial ruling (previously reported on in Sports Litigation Alert below) had found the RIIL violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) by not granting the student a waiver from the league’s eight-semester rule, which limits participation in high school sports to eight consecutive semesters.
The appellate court, however, found that the student’s ineligibility wasn’t solely a result of his disability. The panel highlighted the student repeating freshman year at a boarding school as a contributing factor to his exceeding the eight-semester limit.
Furthermore, the appellate court concluded that granting a waiver to the eight-semester rule would “fundamentally alter” the nature of the RIIL’s athletic programs.
In summary, the panel’s decision focused on two key limits on ADA accommodation claims in interscholastic athletics: the necessity of “but-for” causation between the disability and the discriminatory act and the defense of “fundamental alteration” to the program in question.
By way of background, Sports Litigation Alert reported on the case and the lower court’s finding last year:
Plaintiff John Doe suffered from an educational standpoint during the pandemic, which forced him to learn from “a computer screen.” Wanting “better” for their son, his parents moved him from a parochial school, where he was relegated to remote learning, to an out-of-state boarding school. There he repeated his freshman year “with the hope that he would have a better academic experience and forge in-person social connections with other students of his age.” However, he struggled there, too, both academically and socially. He was subsequently diagnosed with anxiety, depression, and ADHD, among other learning disabilities. His doctors recommended he get involved in athletics. So, his parents re-enrolled him in a private school in Rhode Island, where his participation in football and basketball had a “positive impact on his mental health and overall wellbeing.”
All was fine until the latter part of Doe’s junior year when he was informed, pursuant to the RIIL’s eight-semester rule, that he was ineligible to participate in athletics his senior year.
The association rejected Doe’s claim of “undue hardship” and denied his request for a waiver. His parents then filed a lawsuit, arguing that the league violated the ADA because it failed to make reasonable accommodations based on his disabilities.
“Instead of having John be fully part of a team, the league wants John to sit on the sidelines, despite the demonstrably profound benefits that extracurriculars, like team sports, have on students’ mental health,” the court wrote. “Their justification? Well, that’s the rule, and rules are rules.”
The court continued, noting that Doe’s learning disabilities caused his ineligibility under the rule and his request for a waiver of the rule is a reasonable accommodation. The evidence in the record convinced the court that the rule should not apply here. Other equitable considerations further convinced the court that the rule should not apply. John is not an all-star and his school’s athletics program is not positioned to win a state championship. It’s simple: John wants to be part of a team during his senior year of high school. Like Daniel Ruettiger in the beloved film Rudy, John wants the memory of playing on the field (or court) with his teammates. He is not trying to be the best, take someone else’s place, or gain an unfair advantage. He just wants to play. For that and the reasons below, the court granted his Motion for a Permanent Injunction.
The court went on to compare the instant case to the landmark sports law decision – PGA
Tour, Inc. v. Martin, 532 U.S. 661, 675 (2001), which established that the ADA “forbids discrimination against disabled individuals in major areas of public life, among them employment (Title I of the Act), public services (Title II), and public accommodations (Title III).”
The court noted that “there is no disagreement that John’s learning impairments qualify as a disability under the ADA. The parties instead (1) dispute whether the ADA applies to RIIL; (2) whether there is a causal connection between John’s disability and his ineligibility to play competitive sports; and (3) whether John sought a reasonable accommodation.”
On the first point, the court wrote that like athletic associations that were parties to litigation in other cases, the RIIL is an “instrumentality of the state,” and thus a “public entity” for purposes of Title III.
On the second point, the court noted that “only when he returned to Rhode Island did he face the possibility of being prohibited from playing competitive sports during his senior year. Accordingly, the evidence establishes that there is a causal connection between John’s disability and his inability to meet the requirements of the (eight-semester) rule.”
Lastly, “John has demonstrated actual success on the merits. The record demonstrates that Titles II and III of the ADA apply to the League, John’s disability caused his exclusion under the Rule, and a waiver of the Rule would be a reasonable accommodation that would not fundamentally alter the nature of high school athletic competition in Rhode Island.”
In considering “other equitable considerations:”
- The court noted that Doe “would be irreparably harmed if barred from playing sports during his senior year,” especially since his “doctors recommended that John get involved in interscholastic sports.”
- “In balancing the equities, the court concludes that the harm imposed on John is greater than that imposed on RIIL. … By not competing, John could lose out on athletic programs that have had a substantial benefit on his overall wellbeing and his efforts to overcome his learning disabilities.”
- Finally, “a permanent injunction would not negatively affect the public interest. In fact, it would serve the public interest. Achieving the goal of full inclusion of disabled individuals in economic and social life is in the public’s interest.” See Martin, 532 U.S. at 674-75.
Doe v. Rhode Island Interscholastic League, No. 24-1619 (1st Cir. 2025)
