Mel

Mn- If we talk to another school district about transferring our child to them, will they go back and talk to our current school district? Is transportation covered? They have IEP with transportation currently. We are considering transferring our child to another school district due the school not meeting our child's learning and disability needs (mainly due to them not wanting to meet them as they are known for not accepting kids with special needs). I hate to do it as is a pretty far distance from where we live, but we've had so many problems and have filed a complaint. But how they are treating our child is affecting them emotionally, which is why we are looking at transferring next school year as this one is almost done. Or recommendations on how transferring works with kids with IEPs? Thank you

Thanks! I think we can add it to the IEP here. Any recommendations on how to approach it to the school to have that added without them saying no right away?

Hi, Our child has concerns with executive function and task initiation. She was marked unexcused tardy as per the sped teacher she did not begin packing up when her watch alerted her to and did not leave when directed by the teacher. She has in her IEP the goal to stop what she is doing and Cath because she will not stop and go. This is a life skill goal. Is this appropriate response from the school if the child didn't follow the IEP goal/directions? We live in Minnesota.

MN--Are school counselor case notes subject to FERPA and is something parents can request? There are 2 different things being told to us and needing the information to make an informed decision to help meet our childs mental health needs at school and home as school has continually fought against having any social emotional needs in the IEP or address them at school saying she is fine and doesn't need them (she has documented anxiety that has affected her ability to be in school). And now they are implying our child is lying when we questioned why our child isn't seeing the counselor weekly as we were told she would be and is what it states in the health plan attached to the IEP. Child says the counselor quit showing up to see her a few weeks ago and never responded to a request to be seen last week. They are saying it's due to a mutual decision to end and that she actually did see the counselor on a certain day when she requested to be seen. The child states she never told them she wanted to stop and wanted to keep it. Due to how hard the school fought not to have anything in the IEP regarding social emotional skills and removing the counselor goal and related services I can see them just decide to stop, but our child has not always told the truth on some things either. This though she's been pretty good on as she felt the sessions helped. Another question I had is when they stopped seeing her, shouldn't we have been notified (it's listed she would see the counselor weekly and as needed in her IHP that is attached to the IEP)? Especially as they were aware this could affect how her private therapy is managed and managing her mental health concerns? Thanks

Yes, the neuropsychologist did one the summer of going into 6th grade (which fell on the time of her 3 year IEP re-evaluation). The school was given the report and used the testing scores and some of the recommendations given regarding executive function organization and one math accommodation (offer graph paper). They refused to do the other math accommodations. If I ask for an evaluation for math learning concerns will the school have to do a whole new evaluation for IEP qualifications? Or can I just ask to have accommodations put in place and explain why and show the new data? I'm concerned they will say they have to do a while new one and use that to try to get rid of services we just fought so hard to get in place that they were trying to remove or not meet that would affected her FAPE in the least restricted environment.

They did it in 6th grade. She was having the same issues then as now, but they said she's fine and doesn't need any accommodations..

Thank you! She has Spina bifida. So orthopedic and neurological needs. She has executive function concerns (which we had to fight to get them to acknowledge that and address it in her IEP, PACER the advocate group here helped with this along with getting the school to address the bullying occurring). She was diagnosed also with neurodevelopmental disorder related to hydrocephalus and Neurodevelopmental Disorder Associated with Spina Bifida and Shunted Hydrocephalus Diagnosis by her Neurospychologist. Which is where it talks about how this affects her executive function concerns and math needs related to that (comprehension, remembering, writing and coping the problem down correctly, organization, and follow through). They always say she is in par with her peers or she refused help (which they only offer her graph paper as help, no other interventions when we asked what help she is refusing). Even when we show them the data such as the tests, assignments, MCA state test. They just reply back they didn't see any concerns. At her reevaluation for her IEP last year they didn't note any concerns either. If they are saying she doesn't have concerns all the time, even with data we presented should I ask for evaluation from them first or can I ask for an IEE right away? I feel they aren't taking account of her disability and brush it off. We've had to fight them it feels like for everything. We just had to fight the school about her being able to go to the bathroom this fall :(. They wanted to force her to be able to Cath (to go pee) once a day. The school nurse was very adamant about this as she felt it was okay to go 5hrs between (even though it totally went against it the childs plan of care per her urologist and other specialists and she needs to go every 3-4hrs to prevent accidents and reduce infections). They know she's been hospitalized and missed school for bladder infections, and is at risk of kidney failure related to her disability. It's been documented and they have the information..

MN. What requirements does a child need to meet before the school should be providing para support in math or accommodations in the IEP? What accommodations are available to a child? We spent the first quarter of school attempting to have math support and accommodations put in our child's IEP. The school denied it, the reason they say is because they don't do title one (which she use to be in, but aren't providing it anymore due to her being in 7th grade) and that her grades and scores don't indicate she needs assistance (they refused to put in their comment they made at the meeting of not being able to provide incidental para support -- which they made in the IEP meeting but refused to write in the pwn. I do have this documented in an email of what they told us and they never actually replied back in an email saying that was incorrect and not what they said). Her grades at that point were consistently holding at "D" or "D+". Test scores were around 37-60%. Last year she was c- consistently and same for tests scores. They refused to acknowledge those when shown. Again saying her scores do not reflect needing help. Even as her MCA test said she was not meeting Grade level (they said she didn't put enough effort in it and that's why it was poor). Her neurolopsychologist has documented that due to her disability and executive function concerns she is going to be falling more behind as it gets harder and should have accommodations put in place to help keep her close to level as her peers. The school was given that information also. Now though her math grade has been an "F"" this 2nd quarter. Does she need to be failing for a certain time before we can ask them for help for her again? I'm afraid they are going to say that or refuse for another reason such as she's not putting in enough effort. Even though she literally is struggling as the math assignments get harder. The two tests done this quarter were 69 and 37 percent. She tried retaking the test and correcting the wrong ones (as all kids are able to in her class), she only got a 43% on the retake and rounded average test scores show 54%.

Minnesota- We are in the process of possibly having a conciliation meeting Tuesday. The school had responded to our objections we sent them on the consent/objections form and agreed to meet most of the objections (they finally agreed to keeping the IHP attached to the IEP), but there were some they didn't as they didn't think it needed addressing. One was making sure our child caths (catheterizes) twice at school.7 Our child has nerve damage due to her disability is not able to feel when needing to go to the bathroom until it's to late and has an accident. She is prone to bladder infections and at risk of kidney infections and kidney failure due to them. She has missed school and was in the hospital because of the bladder infections. She has had to leave class to change if has an accident. She is noted in the IEP that at school and home she doesn't stop what she's doing to go, even though she has a watch to help remind her--She has an IEP goal relating to that... She often needs reminders and someone to follow up make sure she goes to the bathroom when it is time due to her concerns with neurodevelopmental disorder diagnosis (which is associated with her diagnosis). The school is only doing reminders to cath, but no follow through. They do not want to make sure she goes twice a day or even state she needs to go twice a day due to her neurological concerns in the IEP or IHP. School states because "she has a watch to remind her to go and all students are excused from class to use the restroom as needed", the school district "does not believe it is necessary to add the student's need to cath twice a day or staff need to remind her to the accommodations section of the IEP." We requested this accommodation so those who work with her know she needs assistance in this area as we were finding out the school had not been following up and making sure she goes like they had in years past. We rejected the schools proposal to not add this into her IEP in accommodations or health related section as we feel this accommodation is needed for her to receive FAPE in the LRE. Without it she would miss school in whole or classes. We are requesting to have this addressed in the IEP under health related needs section or accommodation. We also feel this is an ADA and possible civil rights concern as the School has been trying to force her to only go 1 time at school and make her go 5-6 hours without going to the bathroom. We feel this is why they don't want to add it in, even though she has had this need for many years and they have had to help her with it. This year though nurse has emailed us saying "she is bigger and should have a bigger bladder, so she should only need to go once a day". They continually refuse to acknowledge her disability needs. Any recommendations? Resources we can provide the school to help address our child's needs at school? Thanks for your assistance in this.

Thank you! At the meeting, we did mention about adding what's in the IHP in the accommodations if they didn't want to attach it, but they declined that too....

Ok, I will. Thank you!

Thank you!! Yes, this was for the annual IEP meeting which we usually have to sign off on. They stated in the meeting they were going to unattach the IHP from the IEP, stating they never should have attached it as they were told it is not recommended at the special education seminar they went to this summer, and also when they consulted with their lawyers. They had already made the decision before the meeting and said they were doing this. We disagreed and expressed our concerns on this, we also sent a follow up email expressing the concerns so as to have it in writing. We told them to put it in a PWN and put the exact reason and what statute is stating it can never be attached to the IEP. So they sent the PWN with the comment I mentioned earlier in the revised/draft IEP that they want us to sign and send back. The reason they put in the the PWN though is totally different then what they told us at the meeting.

Minnesota We got the IEP draft today. In the pwn, the school is refusing to keep our child's Individualized Health Plan attached to the IEP. They are stating the reason they can't is per the "bases on the principles for practice guidance provided by the national association of school nurses." And "will only reference the IHP within the accommodations and modification section within the IEP." They are also saying it's recommended to never have it attached to the IEP per other sources. When looking at the proposed IEP, all I see on the accommodation section regarding the IHP is "the health office will inform school staff of child's health care plan. It is also available within the school office." There is nothing else listed on the child's need, what concerns there are, health needs, and what actions need to be done when these issues occur ( such as immediate crisis needs or other stuff that can affect her ability to be at the school, or need to be seen or hospitalized). It looks like it is not very easily accessible. We feel this would affect our child's FAPE in the LRE. We originally had it attached last year due to her health needs severely affecting her ability to be in school and wanting to make sure all teachers that work with our child know what to do when she's experiencing them as when it wasn't on the IEP, her needs weren't being addressed. It helped. Now though they are saying it never should have been attached. Is it true the IHP can never be attached to the IEP? We also never received the updated IHP to sign off, which was supposed to have health needs and information put back in the nurse had taken out. Shouldn't we have had it given to us to to review (especially since it is still attached to the IEP until we sign off on the new proposal)?

Thank you!

Hi, I had a question on invitation to participate in IEP meeting. Someone was just telling me about this and that I should be receiving one before our meeting so we know where, when, who is attending, and what is being discussed. I have never seen this though. Is this correct? We never get any information prior to the meeting.