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NEW IDEA IEP RULES KEEP PARENTS, TEACHERS IN MIND
October 7, 1999
The 1997 Individuals with Disabilities Act includes a variety of new rules governing individualized education plans that can help teachers, parents and students, according to Matthew Cohen, a Chicago special ed. attorney and president of Children and Adults with Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder.
- In addition to spelling out the supports a student will need to meet the IEP goals, the IEP now must also define the supplementary aids, services and/or supports the district will provide for school personnel to enable them to steer the student toward those goals. "Not only is that on the table [under the new law]," Cohen said, "but it's explicitly encouraged. That's a dramatic change in focus."
- Schools must provide some form of feedback to parents, to be spelled out in the IEP, at the same intervals schools provide progress reports, such as quarterly report cards, to parents of general ed. students.
- The student's placement must now consist of not only the student's educational schedule but also extracurricular and nonacademic activities with general ed. peers.
- The definition of a "health impairment," among the criteria for qualifying a student for special ed. services, now includes "limited alertness to academic tasks due to heightened alertness to environmental stimuli." Such language specifically includes AD/HD students as eligible for services under IDEA, regardless of whether they have an IQ/achievement discrepancy.
- The IEP must now spell out the specific starting date, frequency, intensity, duration and location of the services to be provided. In addition, everyone who will be involved in implementing the IEP must be told what their responsibilities are. While that seems like common sense, Cohen said, teachers, particularly general ed. teachers, are often not told they are expected to provide a specific support to the student under the IEP.
The law does not, however, go so far as to dictate that all of the student's teachers and school service providers must be given a copy of the IEP. While the teacher's lack of access to the IEP is a frequent complaint from both teachers and parents, Cohen noted parents can negotiate to have distribution of the IEP to all service providers added to the IEP as a requirement. Or the parents can distribute copies of the IEP to anyone they believe needs it. Such an effort on the parent's part demonstrates commitment to helping the teacher help the student, Cohen argued. "The more you can develop that kind of mutual dialogue and effort, the better off you're going to be."8
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