State and federal laws across the country promise all children a free, appropriate public education. Those laws especially protect the right of children with disabilities to the necessary services, support, and accommodations for them to enjoy and benefit from that education. Educators and the public call those services, support, and accommodations special education. Don't doubt the strong national commitment to special education.
Indiana maintains the same commitment to special education. Don't let your student's Indiana K-12 school fail to live up to that commitment. Get the skilled and experienced attorney representation you need for effective advocacy for your Indiana grade school student's special education rights. The Lento Law Firm's Education Law Team is available across Indiana to help, whether your child attends an Indiana primary or secondary school in Indianapolis, Fort Wayne, Evansville, Gary, Bloomington, Marion, South Bend, West Lafayette, or another town or city. Call 888.535.3686 now to tell us about your case, or complete this contact form.
Indiana's Commitment to Special Education
The Indiana Department of Education maintains an Office of Special Education. The Indiana Office of Special Education declares as its mission that “all students, including those with disabilities, are held to high expectations and have equitable access to educational opportunities that enrich their lives and prepare them for future success.” Indiana puts federal funding behind that commitment. The Indiana Office of Special Education's latest annual performance plan reflects the availability of State Formula Grant programs for local school districts. The federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act authorizes federal funding for those state grants. Your student's Indiana K-12 school likely has the federal grant funds to provide your student with special education services.
Indiana's Office of Special Education not only provides your student's local school district with special education funding. The Office of Special Education also monitors local school use of those funds in compliance with state special education requirements. In other words, your local school officials know that state special education regulators are watching over their shoulders for how they use special education funding to help special needs students. The Office of Special Education also provides data analysis on how your student's local school district is doing in applying funds and implementing mandated programs. The Office of Special Education even provides an enforcement function that our attorneys can help you invoke on your student's behalf.
Problems Invoking Indiana Special Education Services
Indiana's commitment to special education is there. The state has the federal funding and state enforcement mechanisms for special education services. Your student just needs help invoking it. The Indiana Office of Special Education's latest annual performance plan reflects that thousands of Indiana grade school students receive special education services under individualized education programs (IEPs). But, the same report shows that hundreds of those students annually drop out of school while still on their IEP. Special education students drop out at higher rates than students without disabilities. The general reason is that special education students find greater difficulty in remaining engaged in school programs, especially without the mandated services, support, and accommodations. Here are examples of potential problems your Indiana K-12 special education student may face:
- inadequate ramps, lifts, and elevators for wheelchair or other ambulatory access to special facilities;
- inadequate lighting, air circulation, heating, cooling, or other environmental factors aggravating disabilities;
- inadequate soundproofing, hearing protection, or other sight, sound, and stimuli reduction;
- inadequate reading devices, enlarged texts, readers, note-takers, or other services and devices for accessing educational materials;
- inappropriate level for instructional objectives and materials, too far above or below the student's present capability with disabilities;
- inadequate quiz, test, and exam accommodations, including failure to provide time relief, readers, or isolated testing conditions;
- instructor insensitivity, embarrassment, and abuse, misconstruing disability for poor character or effort;
- failure to protect the disabled student from bullying, social isolation, and harassment by other students;
- reassignment of the disabled student outside of the individualized education program without program review and adjustment; and
- failure in other ways to comply with the negotiated and promulgated individualized education program.
Key Special Education Laws in Indiana
Your student has all the legal backing needed to access the available and mandated special education services. The key federal law is the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, also known as IDEA. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act defines which students qualify as disabled for special education services. The Act also defines the assistive technology devices and other equipment the school must provide. The Act also defines what constitutes a “free appropriate public education” as the benchmark for the services a public school must provide.
You may hear of two other federal disability laws, each of which can broaden your student's rights and protections. The Americans with Disabilities Act or ADA provides in its Title II that state and local governments, including public schools, must not discriminate based on disabilities. The ADA may thus provide your student with relief if other, non-disabled students receive special advantages that your student's disability prevents your student from enjoying. The ADA may apply even if the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act would not mandate the specific relief.
Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 is another federal law prohibiting disability discrimination in programs, like many public schools, receiving federal funding. Section 504 preceded the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. Schools and school teachers or officials may still follow Section 504 practices. Section 504 plans, mandated under the law, are still in widespread use despite the newer IDEA mandate for IEPs. Importantly, Indiana Section 504 plans can reach and protect special needs students who do not qualify for an IEP. Students under an IEP generally have greater need for intense support, while 504 plans may apply to students having less of a need, but still a significant need, for support.
Key Special Education Terms for Indiana
To help your student navigate the field of special education services, support, and accommodations, you should know some of the key terms. The above law discussion mentions several of those key terms. They include the following:
- free appropriate public education is the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act's term defining the scope of services, support, and accommodation your disabled student deserves. Schools don't have to provide disabled students with a good or excellent education. Those terms lack definition in any case. Schools must instead provide students with a free appropriate public education as the law further defines that term;
- reasonable accommodations describes the school's obligation to alter its programs, services, or facilities for the disabled student. A school doesn't have to do everything possible that a disabled student might require to receive precisely the same obligation as non-disabled students. But the school must make “reasonable” accommodations, determined by factors such as the cost, availability, and disruption of the proposed accommodations;
- individualized education plan or IEP is the document that your student's school must negotiate and adopt to accommodate your student's disability. The school must follow specific federally mandated procedures when adopting an IEP. Those procedures include notice to you and your right to attend meetings to form and modify the plan. The procedures also require the attendance of certain school officials.
Qualifying for Indiana Special Education
To qualify for special education services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, your student must meet the act's definition of a child with a disability. Keep in mind that the ADA and Section 504 may have broader definitions to protect your child against disability discrimination. But for IEP special education services, the IDEA law lists the following qualifying disabilities, if, by reason of one or more of these conditions, the child needs special education or related services:
- intellectual disabilities;
- hearing impairments (including deafness);
- speech or language impairments;
- visual impairments (including blindness);
- serious emotional disturbance;
- orthopedic impairments;
- autism;
- traumatic brain injury;
- other health impairments; and
- specific learning disabilities.
Generally, your child's Indiana K-12 school has the obligation to recognize your child's potential disability and evaluate your child for special education services. The school owes your child special education services even if you have not made a formal request. But in practice, you should promptly request your child's referral for disability evaluation the moment you suspect your child has a need for special education services. The school may not live up to its obligation without your request and our advocacy. The law permits the school some time to complete the evaluation, up to fifty school days, but schools often complete the evaluation much more quickly. Our attorneys can help you appeal a denial of special education services and request an independent evaluation at the school's expense.
Indiana K-12 Special Education Plans
Once your student qualifies as a child with a disability under the IDEA law, your student's individualized education plan (IEP) becomes your ally in advocating for special education services. The IDEA law requires that your student's Indiana K-12 school form your student's IEP at a meeting of the IEP team. The IEP team must include you, your student (depending on the student's age and your preference), one of your student's regular teachers, and one of your student's special education providers. You may also request that one of our attorneys attend the IEP team meeting as your student's advocate. The IEP team negotiates the written IEP plan. You and your student do not have an absolute right to decide or veto the plan. The IEP plan is a negotiated document. You may get your desired terms, or you may not get all your desired terms. Our attorneys' advocacy may make the difference.
Once your student's IEP plan is in place, your student's Indiana K-12 school should follow it. You and your student have the IDEA law's right to enforce the IEP, with court intervention if necessary. Enforcement typically begins, though, with a request for an IEP meeting to assess the school's compliance and ensure that the school does as the plan provides. Regular teachers, school staff, special education instructors and aides, and other school officials are not at liberty to decide whether to comply with the written IEP plan. The IEP team decides the plan, and the school then follows the plan. Again, you may have access to a court review to impose IEP plan terms the IDEA law requires or enforce negotiated terms.
Special Education Services
The IDEA law not only defines the procedure for adopting a special education plan. It also defines the special education services that should be available to your student. The IDEA law expressly includes all of the following special education services, any one or several of which may become a part of your student's IEP:
- evaluating your child's functional needs within the customary school environment;
- providing assistive technology devices for your child, such as optical character recognition devices;
- customizing, maintaining, repairing, and replacing those assistive technology devices as your child's needs require;
- using other interventions together with assistive technology devices, to make those devices effective for your child;
- providing your child, you, or other family members with training or technical assistance for your child to benefit from assistive devices;
- training or providing technical assistance to other professionals who provide your child with services for major life functions;
- acquiring or adapting machinery, utilities, equipment, enclosures, or structures to support assistive technology;
- providing other instructional equipment, furniture, printed materials, and audio-visual instructional materials;
- providing telecommunications, sensory, and other technological aids and devices; and
- providing modified books, periodicals, documents, and other related materials.
Special Education Representation Available Across Indiana
Special education law is complex. You may find it hard to discern your student's rights to special education services. The procedures to enforce those rights and obtain those services can also be daunting. Get the skilled and experienced attorney help your student needs for special education services. The Lento Law Firm's Education Law Team has helped hundreds of students nationwide overcome educational issues including issues relating to disabilities and special education. Our attorneys are available in Indianapolis, Fort Wayne, Evansville, Gary, Bloomington, Marion, South Bend, West Lafayette, and other Indiana cities and towns. Call 888.535.3686 now to tell us about your case, or complete this contact form.
