SOUTH DEERFIELD — The Frontier Regional and Union 38 School Committees solidified their policies on access to education, student privacy and immigration enforcement this week.

The votes taken by each of the five School Committees — Frontier and the four member towns of Conway, Deerfield, Sunderland and Whately — put in place a policy requiring that the processing of all immigration law enforcement requests take place at the Deerfield Police Station to minimize school disruptions. Any request for access by law enforcement agents will be referred to the Superintendent Darius Modestow’s office before processing.

There have been no reported instances of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents at Franklin County schools.

The policy is similar to the procedure that was already in place, but its status as a formal regulation, rather than a practice by the administration, means this process will be how immigration enforcement is handled from here on out, even if Modestow and members of his administration team were to leave the school districts.

“I did talk and meet with Chief [John] Paciorek of Deerfield and he had no problem with being the place for processing immigration law enforcement requests,” Modestow said, adding that this is a “good solution.” The Deerfield Police Department does not participate in federal immigration enforcement, according to the policy.

The new policy requires agents to present identification and a judicial warrant to the school administration. If no warrant is presented, administrators must request why the agents seek to access the district and then contact legal counsel. From there, school personnel are instructed to contact the student’s guardians and are urged to not provide “information or conjecture about the students, such as their schedule,” without legal counsel approval.

Staff are then instructed to provide the agents with the immigration enforcement policy, contact legal counsel and advise the agents that these steps must be completed before they are allowed access to any school or student data.

Also included in the policy are instructions for the superintendent, or a designee, to develop a procedure for each school building outlining how to respond to immigration enforcement requests, which will include step-by-step guidance for school personnel.

Discussion on the policy was limited Tuesday evening, as it had already come before each School Committee independently for discussion in February and March. At the Whately Elementary School Committee’s February meeting, Modestow cited Plyler v. Doe, a 1982 Supreme Court decision declaring states cannot deprive children from a free public education based on their immigration status.

“That’s the law we are under. … We’ve invited and told students to come here and they’re safe here,” Modestow said at the time. “We will protect students in our schools and make sure their rights are upheld.”

Chris Larabee can be reached at clarabee@recorder.com.