IDEA paper on the IEP PDF

Preview

Summary

IDEA paper...

Description

1 Cassidy Reinholtz SPD-200 12/2/2020 Amy Petrovich IDEA & The IEP Process IDEA, also known as The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, is a law that entitles those with disabilities to receive the proper education and care at no cost to them. This also outlines the students right to be entitles to a free and appropriate public education – or a FAPE. To break that down further, free means of no cost to parents or children. Appropriate means each student gets a plan that is fully customized to them and their academic needs. Public, at the publics expense, and education is for all school aged children. The school needs to first evaluate the child, to see what exactly are their needs, and what services are needed for the student to succeed. A parent can request these evaluations, as can a teacher, at no cost. If a teacher is requesting this evaluation – they must first provide a written consent from the students parent. Once that permission is obtained, IDEA states that the evaluation must be completed within 60 days. During this evaluation, they’ll go over the childs health, hearing and vision, as well as academic performance, emotional status amongst other things. They’ll use a variety of tools and assessments to gather all of the data needed, to then have the school provide the child with proper tools to aid them in their education. No two plans will look the same, as they are completely tailored to that specific student and their needs. Services can include occupational therapy, speech therapy, phsycial therapy and many more options. The CEC, or Council for Exceptional Children, provide professional standards that the educators must follow. These include things such as creating challenging expectations, to push the child to reach the highest

2 level of their capability, having integrity, compassion, respect and many more. This helps have a guideline of expectations for both the family and the educators, to create good professional relationships with the students families. Communication with the members involved in the IEP is crucial to success when it comes to IEP meetings. They need to be able to share different ideas and strategies to help aid the child in the best way possible. When holding an IEP meeting, the parent/s must be present, as well as the special ed teachers, general teachers, and all specialist working with the child. It is nothing but beneficial for the child, for all of these members to be working parts of this meeting, discussing and planning strategies for the student. Parents are a very active part of these meetings, being that they know their child best and can advocate for them properly. The CEC standards I mentioned above, play a magnificent role in these meetings, and how the team works together. The student should be challenged, in order to help them reach their full potential, but in doing so the educators need to maintain professional integrity and competence. It is important for the families to maintain respectful relations with the educators of the IEP team. In doing this, the collaboration will be a smooth running moving train. CEC standards are put in place to help the IEP team collaborate efficiently and come up with a plan that will benefit the student in the biggest way possible. The IEP stands for an “Individualized Educational Program”. This is something that is written for a child with disabilities, big or small. It is developed, reviewed, revised, and has certain requirements and laws that it has to abide by. The IEP puts forth reasonable and measurable goals for the student to work towards. It also lists the special education services that will be provided for the child. In order to have an IEP drawn up, a meeting is held – where a team is assembled of school faculty, as well as the parents of the child. They evaluate and see

3 what the needs of the child are, and what tools will need to be provided to the student, for them to participate in general education with their peers. They will put this plan in writing, but also have an idea of how the IEP will be implemented. IDEA has many requirements that the IEP has to contain, which in turn helps the team construct the most beneficial plan for the student. Some of those being, the childs current academic performance, the goals they have set out for the child, and how the childs progress will be measured. The IEP must also include what services will be provided for the student, or accomodations made for them in class. They also need to include when the plan will start, how long the services will be, where will they be held etc. IDEA also requires that all faculty in the school have access to the IEP, and are properly informed on their duties and responsibilities. The team is then required to meet at least once a year to talk about the progress of said student, and make adjustments where necessary. I watched the “FIEP: A Facilitated IEP Meeting,” video and I really loved being able to visualize how one of these meetings would go. I think preparedness is crucial to having a smooth running meeting. Also keeping in mind that the end goal, is for this child to have every tool they need to succeed in the academic setting. In addition to what I previously mentioned, also having proof and hard facts to back up my suggestions, or my ideas is also important not just for the teachers attending this meeting, but to also reassure the parents that their child is getting their needs met 100%.

4 References Ethical Principles and Practice Standards. (n.d.). from https://exceptionalchildren.org/standards/ethical-principles-and-practice-standards Evaluating School-Aged Children for Disability. (2017, September 09). Retrieved , from https://www.parentcenterhub.org/evaluation/

About IDEA. (2020). Retrieved from https://sites.ed.gov/idea/about-idea/...