Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Supreme Court Case RE: special education

In case you want to keep up with the Supreme Court rulings regarding education for students with special needs, my husband sent this to me.  Good to know, even if we are not quite at this point yet.

They ruled that the public school district had to reimburse a family for private school tuition because they failed to provide free and appropriate public education.  From what I am reading, it is a landmark case because the student, T.A., was never actually in the public school system.  I guess before this case, you were expected to at least give the school a chance to provide FAPE, and if it failed, then you could take your child to private school on the school district's dime.  With this case, you can opt to go straight to private school...?  


3 comments:

Jennie said...

Hi, Laurie. Thanks for posting this. I hadn't heard about this ruling. My interpretation of the article is that private school has always been an option. And if that choice was made after sending your child to public school and finding the school system to be inadequate in the education of your child, you could seek reimbursement from your school system.
I think the court's ruling basically says that you no longer need to give the school system a chance if you know the services are not sufficient for your child's education.
Very interesting...

mom said...

I remember fighting the school board to provide you with appropriate education in 1984 and again in 1986. They never did provide a good program. I hope things are better, now.

datri said...

We're really lucky in the sense that our school district didn't even hesitate when we asked she be considered for private or out of district placement. They know that they do not have the training or staff to provide her an appropriate education. It's going to cost the school district $80K - $100K per year to send her. But it would cost more than that to get an appropriate program running just for her at the local school.