Legal Issues: IDEA and School Business Officials. Part 4: Recommendations

Periodically review all notices sent to parents to make sure they are up to date and comply with current federal and state laws in terms of both content and in languages they can understand.  

Provide parents with notifications of their rights when seeking consent for evaluations, scheduling IEP team meetings, and presenting parents with final IEPs. It is good practice to include a notice of rights with all written communications. 

Take steps to ensure that students are not subjected to differential treatment because of their disabilities. 

Prepare checklists to help make certain that staff members respond to parental requests in a timely and appropriate manner. 

Ensure that record keeping and audits are up to date to ensure the proper use of federal and state IDEA funds. 

Ensure that parents and students receive all of the rights and protections the IDEA guarantees, including privacy. 

Protect parental rights to have input into the evaluation and placement process of their children through frequent communication with them, even if this requires home visits. 

Ensure parental participation in the IEP development process by making reasonable attempts to schedule IEP meetings at times that are convenient for them, while considering alternative means for parental attendance at IEP meetings, such as joining in electronically, via Zoom links, if they are unable to attend in person. 

Listen to, discuss, and give due consideration to all parental concerns and suggestions. 

Provide parents with interpreters for IEP and other meetings if their primary means of communication is not English. 

Allow parents to record IEP meetings if doing so will help them participate in the process. 

Consistent with state law, inform noncustodial parents of their rights with respect to the IEP process. 

Make sure that education personnel, in particular, familiarize themselves with the dispute resolution provisions in both federal and state law dealing with students with disabilities. This is important because procedures vary from one state to the next, especially when it comes to due process hearings. 

Ensure that policies require staff members to notify parents of and explain to them all of their rights to challenge any aspect of the education of their children. 

Provide hearings for parents who object to any of the aspects of the placements of and programming for their children; amend records that are inaccurate or misleading; and allow parents to include statements in their children’s records explaining their concerns if they are not satisfied with how the materials in student files were modified.  

Inform parents about their rights to request mediation, which remains optional, or due process hearings if disputes cannot be resolved at earlier stages.  

Notify parents of their obligation to exhaust administrative remedies unless it is clearly not feasible to do so before filing suit in disagreements over the placement of their children. 

Pay careful attention, in consultation with their attorneys, to the date restrictions in the IDEA and state law concerning the initiation of due process hearings and statutes of limitations, which may vary from one state to the next. 

Comply with the IDEA’s requirement of sharing all information with parents when preparing for due process hearings. 

Keep detailed, comprehensive records of all materials relating to student placements since this information is most useful in due process hearings and judicial proceedings. 

Mandate regular professional development sessions for SBOs, their teams, professional staff, and school board members to help them have a better understanding of how the IDEA operates. Offering such ongoing instruction can help SBOs and their teams to develop policies to maximize the use of their IDEA funds to best serve students with disabilities and their parents. 

Offer informational sessions for parents, qualified students, and community members to keep them aware of the rights of children covered by the IDEA. 

Direct staff to develop and distribute handout materials for parents, qualified students, and community members explaining how federal and state disability laws operate, including detailed information on IDEA eligibility criteria. 

Require staff to post all relevant material about the IDEA on district websites. 

Ensure that compliance officers regularly monitor or audit educational programming to make sure that it meets the dictates of the IDEA as well as other applicable federal and state laws. 

Recognize that in light of the complexity of disability law, when questions arise about it, SBOs and their teams should rely on the advice of attorneys who specialize in education law and the IDEA.