Family & Community Special Communities
Special Education

Preliminary Study of the Special Education Standard for Services - February 2000

Footnotes

¹Data Source: The Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, 13th and 19th Annual Report to Congress on the Implementation of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

²Data Source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data survey; and Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, Annual Report to Congress on the Implementation of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

³Data Source: Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, 19th Annual Report to Congress on the Implementation of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

⁴Data Source: 13th and 19th Annual Reports to Congress on the Implementation of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

⁵20th Annual Report to Congress: Section IV34-37

⁶In Massachusetts, starting with the graduating class of 2003, students will have to meet the state standard for a competency determination in order to qualify for a high school diploma.

⁷Report of 1998 Statewide Results: The Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS), Table 7, The Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, November 1998.

⁸Same source as footnote 7, Table 10

⁹Center for Special Education Finance Brief No. 8: What are We Spending on Special Education in the U.S.?, February 1998.

¹⁰Source of Data: Center for Special Education Finance: State Special Education Finance Systems, 1994-95.

¹¹Geographic Variations in Public Schools' Costs, American Institutes for Research, National Center for Education Statistics, February 1998.

¹²Center for Special Education Finance Brief No. 8: What Are We Spending on Special Education in the U.S.?, February 1998.

¹³Source of data: Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, School Finance Office.

¹⁴This part of the report is drawn from a legal review conducted in FY 99 by Daniel W. Ahearn, Attorney at Law, under contract with the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

¹⁵The federal standard for delivery of services is a "free appropriate public education," otherwise known as FAPE. Massachusetts currently exceeds the federal standard and requires "maximum possible development in the least restrictive environment," commonly referred to as MPD or MFB.

¹⁶"Related services" are interpreted to mean "services that enable a disabled child to remain in school during the day and provide the child with the 'meaningful access to education that Congress envisioned.'" Cedar Rapids Community Sch. Dist. v. Garret F., ___ U.S. ___, 6,7 (1999); Irving Indep. School Dist. v. Tatro, 468 U.S. 883 (1984). Related services include services such as speech therapy, audiology services, psychological services, physical and occupational therapy, recreation, social work services, rehabilitation services, and certain medical services. 20 U.S.C. 1401(22). For example, services such as catheterization and full-time one-on-one nursing services are considered related services. Garret F. at 6,7. "Under the statute, our precedent, and the purposes of the IDEA, the District must fund such 'related services' in order to help guarantee that students like Garret are integrated into the public schools." Id. at 6, 7.

¹⁷In Hendrick Hudson Bd. of Educ. v. Rowley, 458 U.S. 176 (1982), the Supreme Court decided a case where the parents of a student who was profoundly deaf sought the services of a sign language interpreter for her classes. The Court determined that under the federal special education statute she was receiving an appropriate education because she was achieving passing marks in the regular classroom setting, with personalized instruction and support services as prescribed by the Individualized Educational Plan developed by the school district, and she was able to advance successfully from grade to grade.

¹⁸New Jersey's special education statute has since been amended to adopt the federal standard.

¹⁹Subsequent cases in the 1990's have followed this analysis with different results depending on each case's factual context. See, e.g., Kathleen H. v. Massachusetts Dep't of Educ., 154 F.3d 8 (1st Cir. 1998) (child with learning disabilities not entitled to private placement costs because district's program appropriate for child); Amann v. Stow Sch. System, 982 F.2d 644 (1st Cir. 1992) (child denied private placement because district provided an appropriate program for a child with learning disabilities; hence, private placement request denied); Matthew J. v. Massachusetts Dep't of Educ., 989 F. Supp. 380 (D. Mass. 1998) (district failed to provide appropriate program for child with mental health diagnosis; therefore parents entitled to reimbursement for private school tuition); Norton Sch. Comm. v. Massachusetts Dep't of Educ., 768 F. Supp. 900 (D. Mass. 1991) (child with learning disabilities entitled to placement at private school).

²⁰In Massachusetts, the Bureau of Special Education Appeals ("BSEA") is charged with adjudicating any dispute that arises in the context of special education. The Bureau issues an average of approximately forty decisions yearly. See Attachment B. These decisions always reference explicitly the applicable federal and state statutes and regulations, and the decisions reference generally the need to assess each case based upon the balancing of "MPD" and placement in the "least restrictive environment." In reviewing approximately 175 decisions issued since 1995, no decisions discuss explicitly the meaning of the term "MPD."

²¹While the question is beyond the scope of this preliminary study, it may be useful to examine the influence of several different factors on local decision-making (and settlement of disputes) about special education programs and services for individual students. For example, to what extent do school districts and parents decide on IEP's or settle cases because of the attorney's fees provision of federal law? (Under the IDEA, parents who prevail in a hearing or court decision about the child's IEP may recover their attorney's fees from the school district.) To what extent does the greater availability of private special education programs or of trained special education advocates in some states as compared to others, influence local decision-making about special education? Factors such as these may be as influential as the state special education standard, if not more so.

²²In Rowley (1982), the U.S. Supreme Court declined to order a school district to provide a sign language interpreter for a student who was deaf, ruling that the district had met the FAPE standard by providing the student with individualized instruction and an array of specialized support services that enabled her to benefit educationally. (See fn. 17.) A court applying the higher MPD standard to the same facts might or might not order the district to provide the sign language interpreter.

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