Colorado elementary and secondary schools have the same obligation as K-12 schools across the country to provide special education services to qualifying disabled students. Your Colorado K-12 student has the same rights as students elsewhere to a free, appropriate public education. That right guarantees students with disabilities the services, support, and accommodations necessary for their equal access to education. The federal government funds special education services in Colorado, just as it does in other states.
Help is available if your student's Colorado K-12 school is not providing the mandated special education services. You need skilled and experienced attorney representation to advocate effectively for your Colorado K-12 student's disability rights. The Lento Law Firm's Education Law Team is available whether your child attends a public school in Denver, Colorado Springs, Aurora, Fort Collins, Lakewood, Thornton, Arvada, Westminster, Pueblo, Greeley, Centennial, Boulder, or another Colorado city and town. Call 888.535.3686 now to tell us about your case, or complete this contact form. Preserve and pursue your disabled student's educational rights.
Colorado's Commitment to Special Education
The Colorado Department of Education funds and staffs the Colorado Office of Special Education to ensure state and local enforcement of special education rights in Colorado's elementary and secondary schools. The Colorado Office of Special Education implements both the Colorado Exceptional Children's Educational Act (ECEA) and the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). The state ECEA law amplifies and extends the federal IDEA law. The Colorado Office of Special Education distributes federal grants for local school districts to pay for special education software, assistive devices, transportation, and building modifications to serve special education students. Your student's Colorado K-12 school district very likely has the funding available to it to provide your student with special education services.
Your student's Colorado K-12 local school district also has the technical assistance to provide your student with special education services. The Colorado Office of Special Education develops technical manuals and resources, and employs staff, to provide local school districts with training, information, and support for special education services. The Office of Special Education also collects and analyzes school district data to ensure that your student's local district is meeting its disability obligations. The Office even provides a regulatory enforcement function that our attorneys may help you invoke if the school's internal procedures do not provide relief to your student in a special education dispute. Let our attorneys help you obtain the special education services your student needs and deserves.
Colorado Special Education Student Problems
The Colorado Office of Special Education compiles data showing that over one thousand Colorado grade school students under an individualized education plan (IEP) drop out of school each year. That number amounts in the latest data to over 22% or one out of every five Colorado disabled grade school students. Colorado disabled students drop out of school at an alarmingly high rate, well above the rates of non-disabled students. Colorado disabled students also face school discipline far more often than non-disabled students. The Office of Special Education's latest annual report shows that over seven hundred disabled students under an IEP, or just over five percent of disabled students, suffered long-term out-of-school disciplinary suspension or expulsion.
Problems Invoking Colorado Special Education Services
Dropouts and discipline have many causes. But, the vastly greater frequency of disabled student dropouts and discipline likely has something to do with the inability or unwillingness of school officials to recognize and accommodate disabilities. Your Colorado K-12 special education student may face any one or more of the following problems getting special education services:
- the school may fail to provide ramps, elevators, lifts, railings, larger restrooms, or other facilities and accommodations for students who are unable to stand and walk;
- the school's inadequate ventilation, air filtering, air circulation, or other environmental factors may aggravate student breathing and allergy disabilities;
- the school may have inadequate isolation facilities for soundproofing, reducing sight distractions, and other stimuli reduction for concentration for studying;
- the school may lack optical character recognition devices, textbooks with enlarged print, reading and note-taking aides, and other personnel, services, and devices for the disabled student to access instructional materials;
- teachers may impose inappropriate instructional objectives and require the use of inappropriate instructional materials, above or below the disabled student's grade level and capability;
- the school may have inadequate exam rooms or refuse to grant appropriate exam accommodations providing extra time, exam readers, or exam writers;
- teachers may reflect unawareness of or insensitivity to the student's disability, causing or contributing to bullying and embarrassment, while misconstruing the student's disability as laziness or poor character;
- teachers and school staff may fail to protect the disabled student from other students' bullying or social isolation;
- teachers and school staff may reassign the disabled student against the directions of the student's IEP, without IEP team review and adjustment; and
- the school may fail in other ways to comply with the IEP that the parent has negotiated with the teacher and school staff.
Special Education Laws in Colorado
Both Colorado law and federal law support your disabled student's rights to special education services. Here are the primary disability rights laws on which your student would likely rely for special education services. Other laws may also apply. Retain us to help you ensure that the school is respecting all of your student's disability rights and providing all the mandated special education services.
The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act
The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, known as IDEA, is the most widely recognized federal law guaranteeing your disabled student a free appropriate public education. Your student's school may look to the IDEA law to determine whether your student qualifies as disabled for the purpose of special education services. The IDEA law states the assistive technology devices and other equipment that Colorado grade schools must provide to qualifying disabled students.
The Colorado Exceptional Children's Educational Act
As briefly mentioned above, Colorado's Exceptional Children's Educational Act (ECEA) amplifies and expands the federal IDEA law. Colorado's ECEA law generally tracks the IDEA law's definitions. Colorado must comply with the IDEA law. The state's ECEA law cannot reduce the special education rights the federal IDEA law guarantees. But, the Colorado ECEA law provides abundant additional detail for the IDEA law's general definitions. That detail may make it clearer that your student should qualify as disabled for purposes of receiving special education services.
The Americans with Disabilities Act
The public generally considers the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to relate to employment accommodations for disabled workers. But, the ADA's Title II prohibits state and local governments from discriminating based on disability. Local government would include local public school districts. The ADA may reach beyond the IDEA and ECEA laws when non-disabled students participate in educational activities your student's disability prevents. Your student may find relief available under the ADA when not available under IDEA or ECEA.
Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973
Like the ADA's Title II, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 also prohibits disability discrimination in public schools receiving federal funding. And like the ADA's Title II, Section 504 may provide your student with greater protection than the IDEA and ECEA laws. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act addresses certain qualifying disabilities, generally requiring referral and diagnosis. Section 504 may reach lesser disabilities the IDEA law does not include, or conditions that a specialist has not yet diagnosed. You may hear of your student's teachers speaking of a “504 plan” under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 instead of the IEP the IDEA law mandates.
Special Education Terms for Colorado
Appreciate the significance of certain key terms for your student's disability rights to special education services. Knowing these terms can help you understand your student's rights.
Free Appropriate Public Education
The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act guarantees your student a free appropriate public education or FAPE. The FAPE phrase is important because it defines your student's scope of special education services, support, and accommodations.
Reasonable Accommodations
The ADA and other disability laws generally require only reasonable accommodations. The phrase is important because it limits the extent of the school's obligation to modify its programs, services, or facilities. You may think the school should do something for your student despite the high cost or potential disruption. The qualifier “reasonable,” though, means that the school may consider cost, availability, disruption, and other factors when deciding whether to provide what you request.
Individualized Education Plan
The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act guarantees your student an individualized education plan or IEP. An IEPis important because it is the document that your student's school must follow after the IEP team negotiates and adopts it to accommodate your student's disability.
Qualifying for Colorado Special Education
Colorado's K-12 schools need not accommodate every student who presents with any limiting characteristic or condition. Instead, your student must qualify for special education services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act's definition of a child with a disability or the related definitions of Colorado's ECEA law. The ADA and Section 504 have broader definitions but do not provide fully equivalent rights. To qualify for IEP special education services, your student must show a need for special education or related services because of one or more of these conditions:
- intellectual disability;
- hearing impairment;
- speech or language impairment;
- visual impairment;
- serious emotional disturbance;
- orthopedic impairment;
- autism;
- traumatic brain injury;
- other health impairment; or
- a specific learning disability.
Disability Diagnosis and Special Education Decisions
Your student's school should refer your student for disability evaluation when suspecting that one of the above conditions requires special education services for your student to receive a free appropriate public education. But school officials may be slow to refer. You should request a referral if school officials fail to act promptly. Let our attorneys help you ensure referral. We can also help you appeal the school's denial of special education services. You have the right to have an independent evaluation of your student's disability at the school's expense.
Colorado K-12 Special Education Plans
When your student qualifies for special education services, you and your student have the right to participate in forming your student's individualized education plan (IEP). You have the right to be a part of your student's IEP team and to attend IEP meetings. Your student may also participate if able and if you wish. You may also retain us to attend and participate to advocate on your student's behalf. The other members of the IEP team include at least one of your student's special education teachers and one of the regular teachers. The IEP team negotiates and writes the plan. Once the plan is in place, your student's teachers and other school officials must follow the plan. If they fail to do so, or if you believe the plan does not meet the IDEA law's basic requirements, we may be able to help you enforce the plan or your student's rights to a better plan through the school and the courts.
Special Education Services
The federal IDEA law and Colorado's ECEA law also define the special education services your student may receive. Those services may include evaluating your child's functional needs, providing assistive technology devices, customizing those assistive technology devices, training you, your student, or other family members on the use of the assistive devices, training other professionals to help your student use the assistive devices, providing equipment, furniture, printed materials, audio-visual instructional materials, telecommunications, sensory aids, and other technological aids and devices, and modifying books and other instructional materials.
Special Education Representation Available in Colorado
Retain the skilled and experienced attorneys your Colorado K-12 student needs to enforce disability rights for special education services. The Lento Law Firm's Education Law Team helps hundreds of students nationwide with serious educational issues, including disability accommodations and special education rights. Our attorneys are available in Denver, Colorado Springs, Aurora, Fort Collins, Lakewood, Thornton, Arvada, Westminster, Pueblo, Greeley, Centennial, Boulder, and other Colorado cities and towns. Call 888.535.3686 now to tell us about your case, or complete this contact form.
