IDEA and Parent Rights to Participate

Under the Individuals with Disabilties Education Act (IDEA), parents have rights related to their child's individualized education program (IEP). Those rights exist in the context of the special education system that IDEA sets up.  I've always found that understanding and remembering IDEA's basic framework of parent's participatory rights to be easier if you understand the basic process of special education.  At the top of the post is a very simple diagram of how the process is supposed to work.  For each of the four stages, IDEA provides parents with rights to participate--although there is obviously some overlap among them.

(1) Identify Needs: the initial stage is to evaluate and assess the child's needs (and strengths) to establish eligibility for special education and provide the basis for choosing services and settings. Parent rights related to evaluation and assessment include rights to:

• Request an evaluation (or re-evaluation)
  
• Consent or withhold consent to evaluation (but withholding can be challenged)
• Receive procedural safeguards notice (a notice of rights)
• Be on the evaluation team and participate in all team discussions & decisions
  
• In early intervention, direct an assement of the family's strengths and needs
• Obtain an independent evaluation if they disagree with the findings

(2) Respond to Needs: after identifying needs, you need to address them.  This includes creating an individualized education plan and putting it into practice.  Parent rights related to responding to needs include rights to:

• Be on the team that creates the IEP and participate in all team discussions & decisions
  
• Mutually agreed upon meeting times and notice of meetings
  
• Interpreters and materials provided in their native language (as necessary)
  
• Consent or withhold consent to services (some or all in early intervention; all or nothing otherwise)
  
• In early intervention, family services to support the family's ability to meet the needs of their child with a disability
  

(3) Measure Progress:  part of implementing the IEP is assessing the results.  This includes negative as well as positive results.  It also includes IEP planned measurements and situational developments reflecting progress, problems or emerging needs. Parent rights related to progress include rights to:

• Access and review their child's educational records
  
• Participate in any determination of behavior as a manifestation of their child's disability. 
• An IEP team meeting to review the child's progress at least annually, or for early intervention, every 6 months.
  

(4) Report Progress: when schools measure the progress of students, parents have a right to expect the school to take affirmative action to tell them how their child is doing. So, in addition to the above rights, parents have a right to:

• Receive prior written notice of any proposed change or refusal to change the child's identification, evaluation, or placement.
  
• Receive notice of any disciplinary action proposed by the school in response to their child's behavior
  
• Periodic reports of their child's progress (at least as often as reports for other children)

After reporting progress, the cycle begins again by building on what worked and what didn't work and by asking what has changed and what re-evaluations or new evaluations are necessary (if any).

Parents' participation in their child's education is a fundamental principle of IDEA and these rights support that principle.  The above outline, is of course, just an overview.  In future posts, we'll try to specifically discuss some of these rights in detail.  We'll also discuss additional parent rights related to challenging the decisions of schools and rights that parents hold and may enforce on behalf of their child.