Legal Issues: IDEA and School Business Officials. Part 3: Due Process and Dispute Resolution

In attempts to resolve disputes before due process hearings, educators must convene meetings within 15 days of a parent's request for a hearing with a board representative with decision-making authority. If the parties either waive resolution sessions or they are unsuccessful, they may rely on mediation or proceed directly to due process hearings. 

Parents who remain dissatisfied with board actions can request due process hearings presided over by fair and impartial third-party decision-makers. Hearing officers, selected pursuant to state law, cannot be employees of the state or school boards involved in educating students or have personal or professional interests in the outcomes. Public agencies must maintain lists of hearing officers, along with explanations of their qualifications.  

Depending on state law, either state or local school boards may conduct due process hearings. In states with two-tiered systems, if local boards conduct initial hearings, either party can appeal to the state for a final resolution. 

Within 15 days of receiving requests for due process hearings, school officials must meet with parents in mandatory resolution sessions to discuss their disagreements. If the parties resolve their differences, they must execute legally binding agreements enforceable in appropriate state or federal trial courts; parties may void these agreements within three business days of when they were signed. 

If parents and school officials are unable to resolve their differences within 30 days, the due process timelines come into play. Hearing officers must render final decisions based on the record within 45 days after the expiration of the 30-day period, but can grant specific time extensions at the request of either party. The orders of hearing officers are final unless a party appeals. In jurisdictions with two-tiered due process hearing systems, officials must render final judgments within 30 days of when a party files an appeal.

Parties dissatisfied with the results of due process hearings can seek judicial review in state or federal courts within 90 days or the appropriate state limitations periods. Before filing suits, aggrieved parties must exhaust administrative remedies, meaning they must complete the administrative hearing process unless doing so would be futile.  

When administrative or judicial actions are pending, under the IDEA’s “stay-put” provisions, children must remain in their then-current placements, meaning educators may not change students’ placements unless they obtain parental consent, orders from hearing officers, or judicial decrees as established in 1988’s Honig v. Doe. The IDEA includes a two-year limitations period during which parties can request due process hearings. If state laws set different limitations periods, those periods prevail.  

In the first of two important procedural issues, in 2005’s Schaffer ex rel. Schaffer v. Weast, a dispute from Maryland, the Supreme Court affirmed that the burden of proof rests on the party challenging the appropriateness of student placements under their IEPs.  

The second issue addressed whether parents who are not attorneys can act pro se, literally, “on one’s behalf,” in disputes over whether their children with disabilities received free appropriate public educations (FAPEs).  

In Winkelman v. Parma City School District, 2007 litigation from Ohio, the Supreme Court ruled that because parents who are not lawyers have IDEA rights separate and apart from those of their children, they can proceed pro se in litigation challenging the placements of their children.  

During judicial review, courts review the record of administrative proceedings, can hear additional evidence, and grant such relief, discussed below, as judges deem appropriate, based on the preponderance of evidence standard. On appeal, courts largely give due weight to the decisions of hearing officers unless they are clearly erroneous. 

Remedies 

In light of judicial authority to provide the relief judges deem appropriate, perhaps the most significant is that courts can award parents attorney fees, but not expert witness fees, if they prevail in litigation against their school boards. Allowing parents to recover attorney fees is based on the idea that recouping their legal costs would put them in the positions they would have been in but for having had to go to court to safeguard the rights of their children.  

School boards can seek reimbursement of their legal expenses from the lawyers representing parents who file complaints that courts deem frivolous, unreasonable, or without foundation, or when plaintiffs continued litigation after it clearly became frivolous, unreasonable, or without foundation. 

Another important form of relief allows parents to enroll their children in nonpublic schools and try to recover tuition reimbursement. Additionally, courts can award parents compensatory damages to cover the costs for recovering the loss of FAPEs for their children and/or extended year programs that run longer than school terms “when [student] regression will substantially thwart the goal of ‘meaningful progress.’” This can also cover payments for tutors. Conversely, courts deny parental requests for monetary damages from school officials in their individual or official capacities for failing to provide FAPEs for their children with disabilities. 

Courts deny monetary damages for violations of the rights of students with disabilities or their parents, especially if remedies are available under the IDEA. Further, courts refused to impose nominal or punitive damages, nor have they awarded general damages for “pain and suffering” in litigation under the IDEA. 

Next: The next installation of the four-part column will offer recommendations to SBOs and their teams for implementing the IDEA in the schools.