The Lento Law Firm's premier Education Law Team is available to help your Montana grade-school student get the disability services and accommodations your student needs and that federal laws require your student's school to offer. Your student's school should be complying with the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and the individualized education plan (IEP) and process the Act requires. Our attorneys are available for IEP representation in Billings, Missoula, Great Falls, Bozeman, Butte, Silver Bow, Helena, Kalispell, Belgrade, or another Montana city or town. Call 888.535.3686 now, or complete this contact form telling us about your student's IEP matter.
Qualified IEP Representation Matters
Even though federal disability laws require school officials to identify and accommodate students with disabilities, school officials may pay little attention when you advocate for your student's special services and accommodations. You may feel like you've been trying to move mountains on your disabled student's behalf with little or no progress. That's where our highly qualified Education Law Team's legal services and representation can make a difference. Our reputation, relationships, knowledge, skills, and experience can get the attention of school officials. When we notify the school that we have appeared on behalf of you and your student, and when we communicate, negotiate, and advocate for your student's special services and accommodations, school officials sit up and take notice. Appropriate actions often follow. Qualified IEP representation matters.
Avoid Unqualified IEP Representation
Academic administrative forums differ from usual court forums. Local criminal defense attorneys, civil litigators, real estate lawyers, and estate planners may be entirely out of place in a school administrative forum, where the laws, rules, regulations, customs, and conventions differ markedly from court and other legal forums. Don't retain a local lawyer who lacks the knowledge of student disability-rights laws, rules, and regulations and who is unfamiliar with the school administrative forum. Unqualified IEP representation may get your student nowhere and may even compromise your student's significant federal disability rights.
Why Schools Fail to Meet IEP Requirements
School teachers, specialists, staff, and administrators often believe they have good reason to ignore, avoid, and refuse disability services and accommodations. Disability evaluations, services, equipment, and accommodations may cost significant money that your student's school might rather avoid spending, even though schools receive federal funding for those expenses. IEP meetings, special instruction, use of special equipment, modified schedules, and modified materials may also require regular classroom teachers and specialists to spend significant time that they would rather avoid spending. Individual services and accommodations can also require school staff to change convenient habits and practices. School staff may also simply be ignorant of what federal disability laws require and the school district's resources to meet those requirements.
Overcoming Montana IEP Frustrations
Our attorneys can help you overcome school obstacles to your disabled student's appropriate accommodation. You may be down, discouraged, frustrated, and even depressed over the prospect of gaining your disabled student the necessary special services and accommodations. Montana can be a great state in which to educate your disabled student. Montana has the same federal obligations as other states, receives the same federal funding, and likely has the same resources and expertise available to its local schools. You may just need our help in overcoming your frustrations and the school's obstacles to gain your student the mandated services and accommodations. We understand. Let us help.
Montana School District IEP Representation
Montana has well over 100,000 students enrolled in approximately 302 school districts, serving approximately 684 local schools. Montana thus has a substantial school population and the state-level administrative agencies and resources to serve such a substantial school population. No matter the size or location of your student's school district, that district has the technical assistance, funding, and resources of Montana's state education agencies to draw on for disability services to your student.
You and your student may also find the necessary technical expertise and resources for disability services and accommodations at the school district level. Montana permits school districts to organize not just by geography but also by grade levels, such as elementary school districts, high school districts, or in combined K-12 districts. The larger of Montana's many school districts include Billings Elementary School District, Butte Elementary School District, Bozeman Elementary School District, Corvallis K-12 Schools, Anderson Elementary School District, Columbia Falls Elementary School District, Alberton K-12 Schools, Missoula High School District, Great Falls High School District, and Bonner School District 14. Let our Education Law Team help you find the right school officials with the right knowledge, resources, and expertise to gain your student deserved services and accommodations.
Montana's Commitment to IEP Implementation
Montana's Office of Public Instruction maintains a Special Education Office to ensure that the state's schools meet the mandates of federal disability laws and qualify for the substantial federal funding available to implement those laws. The Special Education Office publishes an extensive set of forms and guides to help local schools comply with federal disability rights laws. The Office of Public Instruction and its Special Education Office now also use an electronic Achievement in Montana (AIM) system to ensure that disability forms, evaluations, and services make their way into the student's record for monitoring, analysis, and proof of compliance.
Montana's local public schools thus have the state-level and district-level administrative guidance, forms, and structure to comply with federal disability laws, especially the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) requiring an IEP for each student with a qualifying disability. That Montana establishes and funds a Special Education Office means that our attorneys can invoke state-level backing for your student in any local school IEP dispute. Montana clearly equips local schools with the knowledge, administrative structure, and expertise to meet federal disability law requirements to access and appropriately deploy the substantial federal funding for disability services.
Montana Office of Public Instruction IEP Manual
Montana's Office of Public Instruction publishes a Special Education in Montana procedural manual to guide local public schools. The manual, at well over 150 pages in length, provides detailed guidance for school teachers, specialists, staff, and administrators. The manual begins with a reminder to local school officials of the federal laws requiring disability services and accommodations. It then describes the child find requirements a school should follow to identify students with disabilities in need of services. The manual goes on to detail the parental notice, prereferral procedures, referral procedures, IEP team, IEP meetings, the IEP itself, and IEP implementation, annual review, and adjustment. The manual also describes the qualifying disability and mandated services and equipment. Along the way, the manual provides abundant technical assistance and guidance. Let us help you ensure that your student's school officials are following the manual's IEP process and providing the services and accommodations the manual describes.
Montana Office of Public Instruction IEP Eligibility Process
To receive appropriate IEP services and equipment, your student must generally qualify as disabled under the IDEA law. The Montana Office of Public Instruction's Special Education in Montana procedural manual describes the state's extraordinarily elaborate procedure for determining whether your student qualifies. That procedure begins with a notice to you that the school has identified your student as appropriate for a referral for comprehensive educational evaluation. You may, of course, request evaluation yourself, or you may object to evaluation if you do not seek services. But the school must afford you notice so that you can act as you feel most appropriate for your student.
Montana Office of Public Instruction IEP Evaluation Report
Once the school notifies you of your student's referral for evaluation, the procedural manual next requires that school officials adopt an appropriate evaluation plan. The evaluation plan, once executed, should result in an evaluation report shared with you for review. You may request an independent evaluation at the school's expense if you disagree with the evaluation report. The IEP team will then determine whether your student qualifies for disability services and equipment based on the results of evaluation reports.
Montana Office of Public Instruction IEP Process
Eligibility determinations are only the first step in the IEP process. Establishing your student's eligibility for services does not say what services your student deserves. The IEP determines the services. Your student's IEP team, of which you are an important part, determines the IEP, which states the services, equipment, and accommodations. The Montana Office of Public Instruction's Special Education in Montana procedural manual articulates the IEP process. You should receive formal notice of the initial IEP team meeting and subsequent meetings. The IEP team adopts the plan at the meeting and then distributes the plan for implementation by school teachers, specialists, staff, and administrators, who must adhere to the plan. The IEP team may call a meeting to revise the plan and must conduct annual reviews of the plan. Our attorneys can help you ensure that your student's school is following the mandated IEP process, backed by the federal disability laws and the Special Education in Montana procedural manual.
Montana Office of Public Instruction IEP Team Meetings
Don't let IEP development, adoption, and adjustment happen behind your back. Parents of students with disabilities sometimes, and perhaps often, feel as if school teachers, specialists, and administrators either make up a plan as they go along or develop, adopt, and adjust a formal IEP without the parent's participation. Federal law and the Special Education in Montana procedural manual mandate that the school notify you of IEP team meetings, inviting and encouraging you to participate. Let our attorneys help you enforce your right to participate if you find instead that school officials are conducting IEP matters behind your back.
IEP Team Meeting Conduct
When you attend your student's IEP team meeting, be sure to watch and listen carefully. Be sure to review every evaluation or other document that IEP team members share among themselves. Be sure, too, that you speak up with your insights and information about your student while correcting misinformation and opposing mistaken views and opinions that other IEP team members may share. The IEP team meeting is your chance to advocate for your student. Don't let the education, skills, status, and experience of the other IEP team members intimidate or silence you. You are the most important member of the IEP team.
If you are not up to advocating effectively for your student, then let us help. Attorney representatives may sometimes attend IEP meetings to effectively advocate for student rights. If our attorneys do not attend with you or on your behalf, we may be able to help you prepare for the meeting while communicating with other team members to ensure that they consider your information, documentation, and views.
IEP Team Members
The federal IDEA law and its implementing regulations, and the Special Education in Montana procedural manual, mandate that you and your student are IEP team members. You and your student may decide that your student need not or should not attend, depending on your student's age, maturity, and other interests. Your student's general education (regular classroom teacher) is also a mandated member, as is your student's special education teacher. School principals, assistant principals, special-education directors, or other administrators may also attend to coordinate services and guide and inform discussion. IEP team members sometimes decline to attend if the meeting's subject does not involve their area of responsibility. The team may also invite other non-members to attend if the team's plan may affect their area of responsibility. Let us help you ensure that your student's school is including the right officials in your student's IEP team meetings. Get the right professionals around the table.
Federal Laws Montana's Office of Public Instruction Follows
Congress long ago enacted the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) mandating individualized education plans (IEPs). IEPs are not new to education. Unless your student's teachers are senior employees, they likely had substantial instruction in IEPs during their own education and certification for teaching. At its heart, the IDEA law requires that all schools receiving federal funding, including both public and private schools, provide all students with a free appropriate public education (FAPE). The IDEA law also determines the special education services and equipment your student's school must provide if your student qualifies as disabled. The IDEA law lists assistive devices and equipment your student's school may have to offer to your student if your student qualifies as disabled. Let our attorneys help you enforce these IDEA law rights for the benefit of your student.
Qualifying for an IEP Based on Disability
The IDEA law lists the disabilities that qualify a student for special education services and equipment. To qualify for an IEP and the services and equipment the IEP identifies as necessary for your student's free appropriate public education, your student must have one or more of the disabilities the IDEA law lists. Qualifying disabilities include hearing, speech, vision, cognition, emotional and orthopedic impairments, autism, and brain injury. The IDEA law also recognizes as a qualifying disability “similar health impairments and learning disabilities.” If your student's disability is not on the initial list, your student's disability may nonetheless qualify as a “similar health impairment” or “learning disability.”
Receiving Services Without a Qualifying Disability
Your student's school may voluntarily follow the IEP process and adopt and implement an IEP providing disability services, equipment, and accommodations for your student, even if your student does not qualify under the IDEA law as disabled. Schools sometimes adopt IEPs or offer special services and accommodations for struggling students, even when those students do not demonstrate a diagnosed qualifying disability. But the school would only do so voluntarily, not under the IDEA law's compulsion. On the other hand, if your student hasn't yet received a diagnosis of a qualifying disability, your student could potentially do so now or in the near future with a referral to an appropriate evaluator. Let our attorneys help you determine whether further evaluation could be helpful and who an appropriate evaluator may be.
Other Federal Disability Laws Montana's Office of Public Instruction Recognizes
Montana's Office of Public Instruction, its Special Education Office, and Montana's local public schools must also recognize, respect, and implement two other federal disability laws. These other federal laws may give your student additional or different rights to accommodation, whether or not your student qualifies for services under the above IDEA law.
Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act
Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act, known as the ADA, prohibits disability discrimination in schools receiving federal funding. Schools must not deny students access to programs and services based on the student's disability. ADA claims often have to do with wheelchair ramps, lifts, optical readers, the legibility of websites or other online materials for the visually impaired, and similar access issues. Let our attorneys help you and your student evaluate and pursue these federal ADA rights.
Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973
Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, like the ADA, prohibits disability discrimination. Section 504 was in place before Congress enacted the IDEA law. Your student's school officials may still follow Section 504's requirement for a 504 plan to enable your disabled student to participate in school activities. Section 504 does not define qualifying disabilities, meaning that your student's Section 504 rights may be broader than your student's IDEA law rights. Let us help you evaluate and pursue those Section 504 rights.
Montana Office of Public Instruction IEP Laws
Montana's legislature has adopted legislation, codified in Montana Code Section 20-7-401 et seq., carrying out the state's federal obligations to receive federal funding for special education services. Those Montana state laws, under the heading Special Education for Exceptional Children, give the state's superintendent of public instruction the duty to establish and staff appropriate offices, specifically the Office of Special Education, to support local school districts in meeting the federal mandates. The laws also provide for identifying disabled children in need of special services, distributing federal funds for special services to local school districts, and authorizing the state's Office of Public Instruction to promulgate regulations further carrying out the federal and state mandates. You and your student have state authority behind the federal laws to compel your student's school to comply.
Montana Office of Public Instruction IEP Administrative Rules
Montana's Office of Public Instruction has adopted administrative rules and regulations further carrying out those federal and state mandates. Montana's administrative rules for special-education services appear in Montana Administrative Code Sections 10.16.101 et seq. The administrative rules, among many other things, further define and specify the qualifying disabilities for special services, form panels, and offices to develop and provide technical assistance, and provide for hearings on disputes over qualifying for and receiving special education services. Our attorneys can help you and your student interpret, invoke, and apply those administrative rules.
Montana Administrative Rules for IEP Dispute Resolution
The Montana Office of Public Instruction administrative rules and regulations provide an elaborate procedure to resolve parent and student disputes with local schools over whether the student qualifies for special education services and what services, equipment, and accommodations the school must provide. Our attorneys can help you invoke those rules and the due process they provide so that an independent decision-maker can determine your student's rights outside of the influence of biased local administrators.
Appealing Montana IEP Dispute Resolution Results
The same Montana Office of Public Instruction administrative rules and regulations offer the right to appeal an adverse decision in the dispute resolution procedure. Appeals of administrative decisions are so technical and demanding that they require skilled and experienced representation. Court review is also possible in special cases. Our premier Education Law Team can help with both administrative appeals and seeking court review in appropriate cases.
Premier IEP Representation Across Montana
The Lento Law Firm's premier Education Law Team is available in Billings, Missoula, Great Falls, Bozeman, Butte, Silver Bow, Helena, Kalispell, Belgrade, or another Montana city or town to represent your student over IEP rights and disability services. Call 888.535.3686 now to tell us about your student's case, or complete this contact form.
