Children are our priority. Ensuring their needs are met is our goal.
The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) states that child find must include “Children who are suspected of being a child with a disability under §300.8 and in need of special education, even though they are advancing from grade to grade”. (Emphasis added. See 34 CFR 300.111(c)(1).)
Here’s another curious comment that appears in the same document:
“This is my justification for the length of the narrative in this case—they made me do it!! ? I wanted to separate the three categories of requests that Parent had initiated las summer — IEP, ESY, Reevaluation, Reading inventory testing. Sheesh. It shows the confusing atmosphere that FFX handled professionally. She was making lots of FFX staff work, sometimes in conflict with others. Please edit and make it better, ML.”
Parents have key roles in evaluations preceding eligibility determinations, in the actual eligibility determinations, and in IEP development following determinations. For evaluations, as one example, members must draw upon information from various sources, including parent input. This doesn’t mean schools simply have to consider parent input and then decide if they’ll use it or not. They are required to draw from parent input.
In this article, you’ll find federal regulations (as well as Viriginia regs for those in the area), that define and guarantee parents’ rights.
According to the U.S. Department of Education (USDOE), in its 1.29.19 Letter to Zirkel, “IDEA does not define RTI . . . RTI is only mentioned in IDEA when determining eligibility for specific learning disability. 20 U.S.C. § 1414(b)(6)(B) and 34 C.F.R. § 300.307(a)(2).”
However, the United States Department of Education has stated that, “States and LEAs have an obligation to ensure that evaluations of children suspected of having a disability are not delayed or denied because of implementation of an RTI.”
If something is accessible, it is often an alternative method of access.
For example, a student might need a ramp and an elevator as alternatives to the stairs used by his peers.
Another student might need Braille or large text as an alternative to the text provided to her peers.
Young students might not know their accommodations, while high school-aged students might be embarrassed to request accommodations in class, where their peers can hear them make the request.
In all age groups, the students might struggle with advocacy skills, which result in the student being afraid to ask for accommodations—or in a student feeling it is useless to ask for accommodations, because the school will still do whatever it wants to do.
When compensatory education is proposed, you might face a school district that wants to provide it within a set period of time. Consider, instead, asking that it be provided until each minute owed has been provided in full.
Why?
In its fact sheet, titled “Providing Students with Disabilities Free Appropriate Public Education During the COVID-19 Pandemic and Addressing the Need for Compensatory Services Under Section 504,” USDOE Office for Civil Rights ( cited 34 C.F.R. § 104.6(a) and Barnes v. Gorman, 536 U.S. 181, 189 (2002) in support of the above definition.