Inclusion Confusion | Assessing the New IDEA
NEA Working to Make IDEA Work | Resources

Equal educational opportunity for all. The concept may sound simple, but implementation certainly isn't. Will the new federal law on students with disabilities make things better for all students--or only some?

A generation ago, few classrooms in the United States included students with disabilities. As late as the mid-1970s, an estimated 1 million kids with disabilities weren't even attending school.

Today, children with disabilities are no longer shunted aside and ignored, thanks largely to a string of federal legislative initiatives that began back in 1975.

These federal statutes have changed the face of American education. But they've also created confusion in countless classrooms across America, as educators, parents, and communities have struggled to provide quality education for both special and general education students.

Two years ago, NEA helped prod Congress to improve the federal legislation that governs special education--the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, or IDEA--and the new version of this law enacted in 1997 did make improvements.

But the new IDEA also left many questions unanswered, questions that couldn't be answered until the U.S. Department of Education issued final regulations on how the new law should be implemented.

In March, after receiving feedback from NEA and literally thousands of other groups and individuals, the Department of Education released the final regulations.

What will these new regs mean for your school and your students? NEA Today's Karen Gutloff looks at that impact in three long-debated areas: discipline, paperwork, and the involvement of general ed teachers in IEP--Individualized Education Program--teams.

Discipline and the New IDEA

The just-released regulations for implementing the new IDEA enacted in 1997 significantly expand the flexibility schools have for dealing with disruptive students.

Q. I have a disruptive student with disabilities who constantly undermines my ability to teach. How do the new IDEA regulations help me deal with this student?
The new regulations offer educators more options in the disciplinary action that can be taken with disruptive special needs students.

The IDEA law passed in 1997 gave schools the authority to remove a child for up to 10 days. The regulations released this past March clarify this "10-day rule." It's now clear that a disruptive special needs student can be removed from a classroom for more than 10 school days.

Q. Under the new IDEA, does a school have to provide home instruction and services to a student who has been suspended?
Schools do not need to provide home services to a suspended special needs student during the first 10 school days of a suspension.

After 10 days, that situation changes. You may, for instance, have to send homework home to the student.

Q. If I have general ed students who sell drugs, I can suspend them. But with my special needs students, my hands seem to be tied. Why can't I do something about students with IEPs who commit a similar offense?
Under the new IDEA, you can do something. Students with disabilities who bring guns, drugs, or weapons to school can be placed in an alternative setting for up to 45 days by a school administrator--even over a parent's objection.

Alternative placement allows time for an IEP team to review the offense and decide on the appropriate long-term placement.

An alternative placement could be home instruction or a facility run by the school district. In any case, if you expel a special needs student, you still need to provide the student educational services.

Q. When does disruptive behavior by a student with a disability need to be treated differently from disruptive behavior committed by a general ed student?
If a student's disruptive behavior results from a disability, the discipline administered should follow the guidelines laid out by the new IDEA regulations.

But if the disruptive behavior has nothing to do with a student's disability, that student can be disciplined under the same school policies that apply to general ed students.

If a student with a math disability, for instance, suddenly shouts out in class, that student should be accorded normal disciplinary treatment, because the disruptive behavior isn't linked to the disability.

On the other hand, if a student with Tourette's Syndrome shouts out, that action should be treated differently because it's disability-linked.

But, even in cases where a disability link exists, a disruptive student can still be put in an alternative placement for 45 days, while the student's IEP team decides how best to handle the situation.

Q. Can a disruptive student who completes a 45-day alternative placement be returned to my classroom even if I still feel the student is a danger to me--or another student?
If, at the end of 45 days in alternative placement, a student is still considered dangerous by school officials, these officials can request a hearing, in front of a special hearing officer, to request an additional 45 days.

If this process should end with a decision that directs you to accept a special needs student who still threatens you, you should take the same steps you would take if you were directed to accept a general ed student you felt threatened by. That is, you should contact your NEA local affiliate and seek assistance.

Q. What if my school's administrators are so worried about lawsuits from parents that they won't allow any disciplinary action for disruptive students with disabilities?
You have several options. The most direct: contact your NEA local affiliate.

Support is also available from your state's department of education. Each state has a special education division that monitors how schools are implementing the new IDEA.

You can contact this office to file a complaint. Check the NEA Web site at www.nea.org/publiced/idea for a list of the monitors in each state.

IEPs and the New IDEA

Before the 1997 reauthorization of the IDEA, general ed teachers did not have the automatic right to participate in IEP meetings for special ed students. Under the new regulations, if a special needs student is in a general education program, the general ed teachers involved have a clear right to have input on the IEP team.

Q. Some special needs students in my high school have six different general ed teachers. Do all of us have to attend the IEP meetings for these students?
Where there is more than one general education teacher for a student, the principal decides which teacher should attend the IEP meeting. But the teacher has to be a person providing direct services to the student.

Q. If I am providing direct services, do I have to attend every IEP meeting? I just don't have the time.
You can't be forced to attend every IEP session. According to the regulations, decisions about participation in an IEP meeting should be made on a case-by-case basis.

If an IEP meeting is about speech therapy, for example, and you don't deliver speech therapy services, you don't have to be there. Similarly, if the student is dyslexic, the principal may ask the reading and social studies teachers to be on hand, but not the physical education teacher.

The new regulations also offer options for participating on an IEP team. A teacher, for instance, may be able to submit written reports.

Q. In an IEP meeting, how much weight does my opinion carry, as a general education teacher, if the parents in the meeting disagree?
No one individual on an IEP team determines an outcome. It's the whole IEP team that makes a determination.

Q. Will I be given release time to attend IEP meetings?
The regulations do not guarantee release time. Many NEA locals have bargained provisions for IEP release time, just as they've bargained provisions for other extra or after-school time NEA members are asked to spend on school business.

The Connecticut Education Association has bargained strong model contract language on release time for participating in IEP meetings. You can check this language by visiting www.nea.org/publiced/idea.

Paperwork and the New IDEA

The U.S. Department of Education estimates that the new IDEA regulations will save millions of tax dollars by reducing the amount of required paperwork.

Q. I have an IEP that went from three pages to 29 after the 1997 IDEA law. Will these new regulations add even more paperwork to my load?
Nothing in the new regulations should increase the amount of paperwork you're required to handle. If states follow federal guidelines, there should be no extra paperwork whatsoever.

So why have some NEA members been seeing increased paperwork since 1997? The problem is that every state and district may choose to implement the IEP requirements differently.

NEA is now working with state departments of education to develop and circulate model language for an effective IEP that's not paperwork intensive.

Q. Am I required to give more frequent progress reports to parents under the new regulations?
You are required to provide progress reports for students with special needs as often as you report on general ed students. If you report on a general education student's progress quarterly or on a trimester basis, you can do that for special needs students as well.

Q. Am I still required to test for a student's disability every three years?
No. You don't have to do this testing unless a parent requests it, or unless you're contemplating a change in a student's classroom placement.

Cover Story
Assessing the New IDEA

Few NEA members have devoted more energy to improving the IDEA than Ed Amundson (right), the chair of NEA's Caucus for Educators of Exceptional Children. Over recent years, Amundson has worked to sensitize federal officials to classroom realities and met regularly with NEA members nationwide to help them answer questions just like these.

What's the first thing educators should be doing, now that the IDEA regulations are out?
Educators need to sit down with their special education directors and look at how to deliver services under the law. Faculty and staff also need to educate their administrators about what the law actually says.

Do your research, get the information, then form a committee or group to explore how to implement IDEA in the most effective way.

You fought long and hard for new IDEA legislation. In the end, did we get a good law?
The 1997 law definitely has its heart in the right place: providing the best practice and best services for kids. And the law does strengthen and protect the rights of all educational stakeholders in the process--students, teachers, and parents.

The problem is implementation at the state and local levels. We have to be vigilant to make sure the rules are followed.

What if administrators skirt the regulations and don't follow the new rules?
Unfortunately, you can't legislate backbone. But there are channels you can go through to make sure your district goes along with what the new law and the new regulations say.

Each state, for instance, has a special monitor in place to make sure districts are complying with the regulations.

But we don't have to depend on state officials to get relief. In cases where administrators won't follow the regulations, educators should do what we do when we have a problem that has nothing to do with IDEA. We should organize, through our local NEA affiliates, to remedy the situation.

So don't be afraid to contact your NEA local if your district is falling short, just as you would contact your local on any other workplace issue.

How can educators more effectively deal with parents in the IEP process?
It's a huge mistake to view parents as adversaries in this process. Parents want what's best for their kids, and all of us as teachers and school staff want what's best for kids as well. We need to work together with parents as a team.

How will the new IDEA regulations help educators in the classroom?
I'm urging all my colleagues to get hold of these regulations and educate themselves about the law. Through our Association advocacy, we were able to win a number of good provisions.

Remember, improving IDEA isn't just about improving discipline and paperwork provisions. It's about making a good civil rights law work better for teachers, students, and parents.

What about educators who feel simply overwhelmed by the prospect of reading regulations?
Well, if you're already doing a good job meeting the needs of special education students and have things under control in your classroom, not much is going to change for you with these new regulations. You may not need to take the time to learn more about them.

But if you're frustrated by the way inclusion works now in your school, if you feel under siege, if you are denied the support you need to do a good job for all students, then I think you should pay attention to these new regulations. You'll find that what's here can help you significantly.

Ed Amundson and Diane Shust, NEA's top lobbyist on IDEA issues, are available on the Web all this month to answer your questions about the new IDEA. You can post your question here, or you can send an E-mail to Amundson at neaseeker@aol.com.

Over recent years, few issues on Capitol Hill have engaged NEA more than the need to improve the Indivi-duals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

In 1997, during the Congressional debate over the reauthorization of IDEA, and again this past year, during the drafting of regulations for implementing IDEA, NEA has worked with educators nationwide to press for new provisions that support effective classroom professional practice.

Now, with the final IDEA regulations in place, NEA is working, on a variety of fronts, to help educators master the new opportunities IDEA offers:

• NEA is partnering with the U.S. Department of Education to develop a model IEP for educators to follow.

• The Association has also joined with the American Federation of Teachers and the Council for Exceptional Children to create a new group called Associations of Service Providers Implementing IDEA Reforms in Education (ASPIIRE). The group will be providing accurate information about IDEA to every school site and ensuring that data on successful programs is widely disseminated.

• NEA is sharing with state affiliates updated analyses of the IDEA regulations that note the positions NEA fought for during the regulation-drafting process and the changes between the original and final regs. For a copy of this analysis, visit the NEA Web site at www.nea.org/publiced/idea.

• NEA is completing a state-by-state study of how the IDEA is being implemented throughout the country. The study details each state's special education regulations.

• In late May, the NEA will be hosting a one-day national conference on understanding the IDEA regulations for state affiliates.

• The upcoming NEA Representative Assembly this July in Orlando, Florida, will feature a forum where members can pose questions about IDEA regulations and their impact on the classroom.

• Check out the NEA Web site for information on obtaining copies of the new IDEA regulations. The site also features information on how the IDEA regs impact classroom educators. The address: www.nea.org/publiced/idea.

• Download the actual IDEA '97 law or look up background information on the Department of Education Web page. Log on to http://www.ed.gov/offices/OSERS/IDEA.

• The IDEA Practices Web site points to IDEAs That Work and other information on implementing IDEA '97. The site also explores the legal issues surrounding the new regulations. Visit the site on the Web at http://www.ideapractices.org/.

• Written by teachers, the NEA Professional Library's Toward Inclusive Classrooms shows how teachers at all grade levels are integrating students with special needs into regular classrooms. $9.95 plus $2.50 s&h for NEA members. Stock #2903-8-00-F. To order, call 800/229-4200.

• The National Information Center for Children and Youth with Disabilities offers several free resources. For a free catalog, contact NICHCY, P.O. Box 1492, Washington, DC 20013-1492, 800/695-0285. You can also find this material on the Web at http://www.nichcy.org/.

• The Consortium for Appropriate Dispute Resolution in Special Education (CADRE) provides support and materials that can help implement the dispute resolution requirements in IDEA '97. Log on to www.directionservice.org/cadre.

• In Creating Schools for All Our Students, hear from 12 school-based inclusion teams that share their real-life experiences of integrating an inclusive approach. $13 plus $5 s&h for NEA members. Stock #1865-6-00-F. To order, call 800/229-4200.

• Discover the emerging trends and preferred practices for teaching exceptional students in regular classrooms in Children with Exceptional Needs in Regular Classrooms. The book also contains some of the legal requirements for teaching students with special needs. $10.95 plus $5 s&h for NEA members. Stock #3009-5-00-PL. Call the NEA Professional Library at 800/229-4200.