school special education « Special Education Today

7 November 2009

Poll Results In; We’re Back in First Place

As a part of the fun component of the special education law blog, we run a poll on the lefthand side of the blog. These are not scientific endeavors, and we do not pretend that the results resemble science in any way. Nonetheless, we think that they are fun. The most recent poll just ended. The question was: Given the recession, should cost/money be a defense in special education cases? Here are the results:

43 (62%) No, money is no excuse
17 (25%) Yes, school districts don't have money
7 (10%) Maybe, tough question

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2 ( 3%) I'm too poor to answer
0 ( 0%) No opinion

Thanks for voting. Pretty lopsided results. Case closed. (That's a joke, as readers of this blog know, no case is ever closed in special education law!)

In other breaking news, this blog is back in first place in the best education blog category for the 2009 Bloggers Choice Awards. The contest is very close, please vote for this blog. We were lucky enough to finish in first place in the best education blog category last year, and it would further boost our credibility if we can repeat. You will have to sign up and respond to an email, but we really appreciate your support. If you would like to vote for this blog, you can click on the Bloggers Choice Awards button on the left hand side of the blog or else follow this link. There are a bunch of other interesting blogs to check out on the Bloggers Choice Awards website, and they are organized by category.

Remember that you can now read this blog on your mobile phone. Of course, you miss all the polls and links and resources and really cool pictures of me, but you do get the posts. Just bookmark this website: http://www.xfruits.com/jimgerl/?id=79913

Don't forget to check out all of the other resources on the lefthand side of the blog. There are lots of links to other websites and blogs with a wealth of information about special ed and special ed law. For example, you can follow the news by reading the headlines of the smartbrief issued every weekday by the Council for Exceptional Children. (This is an example of a blog widget or blidget) You can also see what's happening in the education blog world by clicking on the blognetnews button. There are also links to the exciting special education law groups we have created on the social networking sites Facebook, Ning, LinkedIn and Plaxo.

Finally, if you haven't already done so, please take one of the free subscriptions to this blog that are available on the lefthand side of the blog. Numbers help achieve credibility in the blogosphere. We have a lot of great subscribers, but we always welcome more. Please spread the word. There are three ways to subscibe: by email (you have to respond to an email to activate it); through an RSS feed to an aggregator or reader (like Google Reader or Bloglines or Netvibes, etc); or if you have a blog or website, through a blidget (a blog widget that shows this blog's posts an/or headlines right inside your blog or website). Thanks you for reading.

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26 October 2009

Disability Statistics: All in One Place

Filed under: Disability, Gerl, Statistics, school special education, special education law — Jim Gerl @ 8:49 pm

People often ask me about statistics. Sometimes even in combination with a lawyer joke.

If you're like me, it is hard to keep numbers at your fingertips. Don't get me wrong, I loved mathematics; I even took calculus. I just hate arithmetic (the actual adding, dividing, or otherwise dealing with numbers.) Hence my reluctance to even attempt quoting statistics.

But statistics are important in the disability arena, and I have discovered an important resource that provides a wealth of disability related statistics. An agency with a brutal name provides a great service. The agency is the Rehabilitation Research & Training Center on Disability Statistics & Demographics, or to its friends - Stats-RRC. Here is their website.

They publish an annual report with a wealth of information. The Annual disability Statistics Compendium - 2009 is a gold mine. The 160 page report has all kinds of statistics on the prevalence of disabilities, and the education and employment of persons with disabilities. You can download or read the entire report here.

Here are some stats to whet your appetite: 21.1% of Americans have a disability of some sort. The state with the lowest percentage of people with a disability is Utah with 8.9%. The highest is West Virginia with 19%.

As of the Fall of 2007, of the total of 49 Million students aged 6-17 in the United States, about 5.6 Million, or about 11.4%, receive special education services under IDEA. Of the 5.9 Million students aged 6 to 21 who receive special education services under IDEA, about 4.7 Million, or 79.8 %, spend at least 40% of their day in the regular education classroom. (As with most other categories in the report, there are breakdowns for these stats by state.)

By type of disability, the 5.9 Million students aged 6 to 21 receiving special education under IDEA, the breakdown by eligibility category is as follows:

2.6 Million specific learning disability 43.3%
1.1 Million speech/language impairment 19.2%
624,000 other health impairment 10.6%
487,000 mental retardation 8.3%
438,000 emotional disturbance 7.4%
257,000 autism 4.3%
131,000 multiple disabilities 2.2%
88,000 developmental delay 1.5%
71,000 hearing impairment 1.2%
60,000 orthopedic impairment 1.0%
26,000 visual impairment 0.4%
24,000 traumatic brain injury 0.4%
1,300 deaf/blindness 0.02%

There is a lot more detail in the charts and statistics contained in the report. I highly recommend it to everybody interested in special education.

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18 August 2009

Reflections on the IDEA Remedies Tour: The Nature of Compensatory Education

Filed under: Education Law, Gerl, disabilities, education, law, school, school special education, special education law — Jim Gerl @ 3:08 pm

This is the second in a multiple part series of posts on my IDEA Remedies Tour, the joking name I gave to my presentations this summer on the major remedies available when the parent/student prevails in an IDEA due process hearing or appeal. I really love the people part of these conferences, but the next several installments involve the legal aspects of these remedies.

The main purpose of this blog is to educate people about the rapidly changing field of special education law. The next posts in this series may be somewhat technical

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, but hey, that's the law baby! (Note, some font changes here seem to be beyond my control. I plead ignorance.)
>

The Nature of Compensatory Education

Compensatory education is a form of relief that may be awarded by a hearing officer or court after finding a violation of IDEA. It constitutes an award of services to be provided prospectively in order to compensate for a deficient educational program provided in the past. G ex rel RG v. Fort Bragg Dependent Schools 40 IDELR 4, (4th Cir 8/6/03).

Although the U. S. Supreme Court has not specifically recognized the availability of compensatory education, it has declared that courts, and presumably hearing officers, have broad equitable powers to fashion appropriate relief where there has been a violation of IDEA. Burlington Sch. Comm. v. Dept. of Educ., et. al. 105 S.Ct. 1996, 556 IDELR 389 (1985). In the same decision, the high court recognized that reimbursement for a unilateral placement was among the appropriate relief that could be granted for such a violation. Burlington, supra.

Since Burlington courts and hearing officers have reasoned that because reimbursement is a viable remedy for an IDEA violation, compensatory education must also be among the relief that may be granted for such a violation. The logic is that if reimbursement for obtaining compensatory services may be granted, failure to recognize the ability to award compensatory services themselves would make the child’s ability to obtain relief dependent upon the resources of his parents to effectuate a unilateral placement. Such a result would not be consistent with IDEA’s purpose of ensuring that every child with a disability have available to him a free and appropriate public education. See, Reid ex rel Reid v. District of Columbia 43 IDELR 32 (D.C. Cir. 3/25/05).

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2 July 2009

New Supreme Court Decision- Part IV (Hearing Officer Authority)

Filed under: Supreme Court, United States Supreme Court, due process, education, hearing officer, law, reimbursement, school special education, special education law, unilateral placement — Jim Gerl @ 11:32 am

Those of you who follow this blog know that I was concerned about the school district's argument that hearing officers lacked authority to grant reimbursement. I had never heard this argument made before. NOTE: I have a bias here, I am a due process hearing officer for a growing number of states and I train hearing officers across the country. A few commentators have dismissed this issue as a "nonstarter," but at least three justices asked questions concerning the argument at the oral argument. Maybe others gave this argument little attention, but believe me, hearing officers were taking it seriously.

As my preliminary analysis noted the supremes specifically noted at page 17 of the slip opinion that both hearing officers and courts have the authority to grant reimbursement for un

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unilateral placements in proper circumstances. The Court explained its reasoning in footnote 11 on page 13 of the majority opinion.

Specifically, the Court ruled that the district's argument concerning hearing authority ignores the Burlington decision. The high court stated that the Burlington decision interpreted IDEA "... to authorize hearing officers as well as courts to award reimbursement notwithstanding ...(Section 615's) silence with regard to haring officers." n. 11, Slip Op at p. 13. The opinion goes on to state that by amending IDEA without altering the text of the section, Congress implicitly adopted the Supreme Court's construction of the statute regarding hearing officer authority to award reimbursement.

Forest Grove Sch Dist v TA 557 U.S. ____, 109 LRP 36046 (6/22/2009) is an important decision for hearing officers to cite in their decisions. It is clear that this decision reiterates the ruling of Burlington that hearing officers ,like courts, have broad equitable discretion to award an appropriate remedy where there has been a violation of IDEA.

here are some additional resources: First, a couple editorials applauding the ruling: St. Louis Dispatch and Boston Globe. The SCOTUS blog resource page concerning this case includes analysis, briefs by the parties, amicus briefs and a transcript of the oral argument at the high court. A law review article written before the decision discusses some policy concerns can be found here. This link has three perspectives on the ruling.

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