Steph

The district is dramatically altering an accommodation claiming that the accommodation constitutes a denial of FAPE to the OTHER students. The back story: for several years our 16yo son has had an accommodation in his IEP that he may redo any assignment or test where he scores below a 70%. The school psychologist called me about two weeks ago to discuss his upcoming IEP and said the school would like to lower that threshold to 60 saying that they want him to mature into taking on more responsibility himself. I said I would consider lowering the threshold to 65%. Had the IEP last Thursday and they now say any redo threshold higher than a 60% constitutes a denial of FAPE to the OTHER students, saying it gives my son an unfair grade advantage. I am preparing to write the PWN. I have some arguments lined up, such as a district policy denies the “individual” in IEP; that, by their logic, ANY accommodation could be denied as “unfair” to other students (even though that is completely against the definition of an accommodation—something he needs to get FAPE in his education is not unfair); we are interested in mastery of the material, and grades are just a measurement; and data shows that he uses this accommodation at the 70% threshold (IEP is s opposed to be data driven). I do personally know of another 10th grader (who I’ll keep nameless even though the guardian told me) who has been offered 65%, so know it’s not being evenly applied, but am not sure bringing up other kids will help or hinder? Any other areguments I’m missing? I’m just flabbergasted.