Special Education Law and Advocacy
When a parent disputes a decision made by a school district regarding the special education and/or services of their child, one option is to file a “Due Process Complaint”. [See Procedural Safeguards, 20 USC 1415(b)(6) and (c)(2).] When a complaint is filed, the state’s Department of Education assigns the case to an “Independent Hearing Officer”. […]
Recently, I was asked this (not so) hypothetical: “4th grade child has an IEP (high functioning Down Syndrome) and is placed in a life skills classroom. There is one special education teacher and seven aides rotating through the classroom. Reading and math instruction is being solely taught by an aide with the teacher touching base […]
Many parents are aware of their child’s diagnosis (or the symptoms of the diagnosis), but perhaps have never formally received a diagnosis for their child from a physician. Why is a diagnosis important? A child must have a diagnosis that fits within 13 categories of disability in order for that child to be eligible for […]
Since the U.S. Department of Education more or less mandated implementation of the ‘Common Core‘ education standards on a state level, I have seen numerous examples of how such suggested teaching method fails. As a small example, several states have opted out of the Common Core or backed away from some of the assessments associated […]
I think many, too many, lawyers have forgotten what the ethics rules (“Rules of Professional Conduct”) really say. I encourage every lawyer (especially school district counsel) to go back and read their ethics rules (each state has their own, based on the ABA’s Model Rules of Professional Conduct) periodically. This will help them understand that […]
Your child is not receiving the attention or services he or she needs in school. As a result, your child is doing poorly in school. You’re not even sure of the cause of the problem, but you know something is wrong. What do you do? If you are the parent of a child with special […]
On January 6, 2011, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie signed into law one of the toughest anti-bullying civil rights laws in the United States. As with most laws, the creation of the law was the easy part. The difficult part is the enforcement. Most states have anti-bullying laws (some, like New Jersey apply to cyberbullying) […]
When is it time to hire a special education lawyer? I’ll explain how to keep this from being a $64,000 question. I’ll answer this question in a moment, but the first thing to understand is the special education process. Understanding the Special Education Process Briefly, the process usually follows these steps: (1) either the parent […]
The answer to the question posed in the title is, typically, lawyerly – it depends. What is the “practice of law”? “Unauthorized practice of law (UPL)”? First, let’s discuss what is the “practice of law” and “UPL”. Virtually every licensed occupation is regulated by the State. For example, in Pennsylvania, the Bureau of Professional and […]
There is a bad reputation out there for special education lawyers, advocates and parents of special education kids. The reputation is that we hate all school teachers and those who work in the schools and we are simply out for vengeance. I’m going to focus this post on the misrepresentation that I must hate teachers […]
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