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CH11PlacingStudentsintheLeastRestrictiveEnvironment.pptx

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The Law and Special Education

Fifth Edition

Chapter 11

Placing Students in the Least Restrictive Environment

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Learning Objectives

11.1 Describe the least restrictive environment mandate of the I D E A.

11.2 Describe the differences among the concepts of least restrictive environment, mainstreaming, and inclusion.

11.3 Describe the continuum of alternative placement and how school district personnel are to use the continuum.

11.4 Describe the Describe relevant considerations that team members should address when determining a student’s placement in the least restrictive environment.

11.5 Describe the Describe the decisions in major cases that have addressed the least restrictive environment mandate.

11.6 Describe the model for determining a student’s least restrictive environment.

Introduction

We are concerned that children with handicapping conditions be educated in the most normal possible and least restrictive setting, for how else will they adapt to the world beyond the educational environment, and how else will the nonhandicapped adapt to them.

-Senator Robert T. Stafford, Sponsor of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, May 20, 1974

Least Restrictive Environment, Mainstreaming, and Inclusion

Inclusion: A general philosophical stance that sometimes is adopted by schools as practice. It is simply the idea that all students with disabilities will spend the majority or all of their time in the general educational environment.

Mainstreaming: A somewhat dated term that also refers to a philosophy of educating students with disabilities in settings with nondisabled students.

Least restrictive environment: The mandate within the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (I D E A) that students with disabilities should be educated to the maximum extent appropriate with their peers who do not have disabilities.

The L R E Mandate

Part 1: To the maximum extent appropriate, children with disabilities, including children in public or private institutions or other care facilities, are educated with children who are not disabled, and that

Part 2: special classes, separate schooling, or other removal of children with disabilities from the regular educational environment occurs only when the nature or severity of the disability is such that education in regular classes with the use of supplementary aids and services cannot be achieved satisfactorily (I D E A, 20 U.S.C. § 1412(a)(5)(A))

L R E: A Rebuttable Presumption

The first part of the definition addresses the presumptive right of all students with disabilities to be educated with students without disabilities. Schools must make good-faith efforts to place and maintain students in less restrictive settings.

The second part of the definition allows this presumptive right, to be rebutte; that is, the principle sets forth a general rule of conduct (i.e., integration) but allows it to be rebutted when integration is not appropriate for a student Turnbull, Stowe, & Huerta, 2007). The I D E A favors integration, but recognizes that for some students more restrictive or segregated settings may be appropriate.

Rowley on L R E

Despite this preference for “mainstreaming” handicapped children—educating them with nonhandicapped children—Congress recognized that regular education simply would not be a suitable setting for the education of many handicapped children . . . the act thus provides for the education of some handicapped children in separate classes or institutional settings.

Rowley, 1982, page 192

The I E P Planning Process

Considerations in Using the Continuum

A placement is deemed more restrictive the less it resembles a regular classroom environment.

Supplementary aids & services shall be used to maintain a student in the L R E

Resource room

Itinerant instruction

Determining Student Placement

A team of qualified individuals and a student’s parents and other persons who are knowledgeable about a student, the meaning of the evaluation data, and the placement options is the group that determines a student’s placement (usually I E P team but does not need to be)

Placement errors

Placement decisions should not be based solely on factors that are unrelated to a student’s actual needs (e.g., category of disability)

A student’s placement must not be predetermined.

An I E P team should not determine a student’s placement prior to developing his or her I E P.

Additional Placement Considerations

Placement in the Neighborhood School

Supplementary aids and services

Nonacademic Programming

Extra curricular activities

The Interests of Peers Without Disabilities

Judicial Standards of Review

The Roncker test (6th and 8th Circuits)

Key case: Roncker versus Walter (6th Cir. 1986)

The Daniel test (2nd, 3rd, 5th, 10th, and 11th Circuits)

Key case: Daniel R.R. versus State Board of Education (5th Cir. 1989)

The Rachel H. test (9th Circuit)

Key case: Sacramento City Unified School District versus Rachel H. (9th Cir. 1994)

The DeVries test (4th Circuit)

Key case: DeVries versus Fairfax County School Board (1989)

Factors in Determining L R E

Individualization

Appropriateness

Integration

Benefits to the student

Effect on Peers

Flowchart for Determining L R E

Lessons from Litigation & Legislation

Principle 1: The primary objective when developing a student’s special education program is appropriateness.

Principle 2: Place students in settings in which they have the most contact with their nondisabled peers.

Principle 3: Use the continuum of placements to determine the least restrictive appropriate placement.

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