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Special Education Laws

Name

Grand Canyon University

SPE-812

June 17, 2022

Kathleen Tate

Special Education Laws

The CASE offered a development proposal aimed at improving special education through promoting self-worth, dignity, potential, and uniqueness and ensuring students with disability are at par with nondisabled children. One of the recommendations aims to propose total funding for special education since the cost of this education system is higher than that of normal children. The increase in the number of children with disabilities has made it necessary to increase funding for special education n to promote equality among children and achieve total funding by 2021 (CASE, 2017).

Another recommendation is to oppose subsidizing private education because it does not offer equal opportunities for students with disability. Moreover, a public subsidy of private education goes against the interests of the taxpayers, communities, and the public school system. There is a lack of accountability in the private schools, and these institutions do not comply with the provisions of the Individuals with Disability Education Act (IDEA) (CASE, 2017).

CASE also recommends the revision of Independent Education Evaluation Request Requirements. IEE is provided at public expense, and parents are allowed to evaluate all records relating to children with disability. Another recommendation regards the redefinition of severe bodily injury as a serious physical injury that requires the presence of a healthcare professional and absence from school. Moreover, an expansion of maintenance of effort exception with a view of the integration of systemic changes in education in relation to early intervention, improved efficiencies, and lower expenditures due to low-cost technology. Monitoring requirements regarding disproportionality and promote accountability and flexibility and early intervening funds. There is also required that facilitated IEP team meetings with trained facilitators at no cost where conflicts are taking place. Where the IEP team should not be used, facilitation should be provided at no cost. CASE also provides that a due process be filed only after the school district is aware of any formal disagreements before allowing parents to file a complaint under the IDEA (CASE, 2017). This aims to enable school districts to address many issues relating to due process for students and their families.

There are other recommendations regarding functional behavior assessments. CASE recommends that functional behavior assessments should not be subjected to IEEs. The requirements are to be revised for FBAs and behavior intervention plans under the provision of IDEA discipline. Moreover, CASE requires that a consistent burden of proof be confident across states in those cases seeking relief bears the burden. Moreover, there are recommendations to change emotional disturbance to emotional and behavioral disability, which aims to eliminate the negative notions associated with emotional disturbances.

History of Special Education Law

The history of special education has had a significant past that has influenced the modern nature of education. The issue of special education started attracting serious attention from stakeholders in 1954 in the case of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka in Kansas, where education was identified as an important determiner of life success. The case's original motive was to address civil rights issues. Still, the outcome resulted in the case being applied in special education for students denied an opportunity to get an appropriate education. The Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 was responsible for offering opportunities to learners. However, in 1966 this board was amended so that it would help in funding the special education. Rehabilitation Act of 1973 was important for those seeking special education as it posited that people with disabilities would not be denied a chance in an education system that received federal funding. The most significant changes in education laws occurred in the 1970s, with the passage of the Individual with Disabilities Education Act in 1975 (Rodriguez & Murawski, 2020).

Moreover, successful cases that banned students with disabilities from attending public schools were another significant milestone in the history of special education since it provided a clear opportunity to protect their rights to equity through participating in all educational programs. The PARC and Mills cases are examples of such cases that originally intended to protect the rights of students with disabilities. On its part, IDEA has created a procedure that aims to safeguard students' rights and provides parents of children with disabilities with to challenge decisions in the education system. Some of the significant changes include the No Child Left Behind, as advocacy for the role of the Department of Education to escalate measures to ensure all the states were in compliance with and performance reported to avoid losing federal funding (Rodriguez & Murawski, 2020). Such steps have had significant milestones in improving special education and formulated a framework that could be utilized to improve special education in different states in collaboration with the Department of Education.

In 1982, the Board of Education of Hendrick Hudson Central School District v. Rowley created a pathway that required students with disabilities access individualized instructions to ensure their educational needs were met. Other changes in IDEA were made in 1997 to ensure measurable and meaningful programs were in place for students with disabilities. In the modern education system, all students are recognizable under the provisions of IDEA, and all public education institutions in the United States should adhere to such guidelines (Rodriguez & Murawski, 2020).

Current Special Education Legislation

The current special education legal guidelines advocate for free and appropriate education (FAPE). This was passed in March 2017 by the Supreme Court in the case of Endrew F. v. Douglas County School District. However, FAPE has been in existence since 1975, and no changes have been applied to it. The current education standards have been established to make progress in the benefits and the extent to which such benefits must be maintained at a minimum. As such, schools are required to provide students with an education that matches an IEP that is reasonable and makes the child progress irrespective of their education or physical standards. Therefore, the law requires children to access education irrespective of their abilities.

Positive and Negative of Proposed Changes to IDEA

Positives

One of the proposed changes in the full funding of IDEA. However, inadequate funding for IDEA makes it difficult to offer the full benefits children with disabilities are expected to receive regarding existing needs. Moreover, the realization that fund requirements for children with disabilities are higher than that of normal children will help ensure that all institutions can create an environment by availing of the necessary resources to make special education more effective. This would be supported if the recommendation to derive private education from a public subsidy would avail the necessary funds for special public education. Further, parents are supposed to make a notification to schools before making a complaint through due process under idea. This is aimed at making it possible to make the necessary modifications to ensure the complaints raised by the parents are addressed amicably. This would help save on time and resources utilized while trying to follow judicial procedure and addressing such complaints in court. It is also important that the proposed changes to IDEA, like changes in terminologies that would look offending such as emotional disturbance to an emotional and behavioral disability, would help create a positive picture (Mitchell et al., 2019). Therefore, the recommended changes would have significant positive changes that would positively change the outlook of special education.

Negatives

Some of the negative implications of the recommended changes to IDEA is that withdrawing funds from private education is unfair to the taxpayers. All parents are taxpayers, and denial of private education finding would be unfair to the children. Therefore, the proposals should establish equity rather than look discriminatory and unfair in the face of the public. Notifying schools while filing a complaint via due process is likely to interfere with the course of justice since the schools may fail to act according to the agreed terms concerning the issue of concern. As a result, such provisions may interfere with the central idea behind the formulation of IDEA (Mitchell et al., 2019).

Alternative Proposals

It is important to have a better approach to addressing parents’ grievances without filing due process. Therefore, in case of a conflict, teachers must be trained on how to handle conflicts presented by the parents. Preparation of the appropriate programs is a great way of ensuring program deficits in teachers’ training are integrated. These programs should focus on dispute resolution to enable teachers to address parents complaining about certain programs and promote a conducive relationship that fosters meaningful special needs education. Moreover, teachers should acquire the right skills to enhance the teacher-parent relationship.

Additionally, educational professionals and parents should take an active role in preparing IEP and put in place a guideline under which set guidelines should be implemented. All the facilitators of the program should be given a guideline that will help guide parents and ensure all the objectives of reprogramming are met. It would also ensure parents are active participants in the process (Padia & Traxler, 2020). Issues arising should be addressed at the local level instead of involving attorneys at the beginning.

References