IEP and 504 Issues and Questions

How does this present with ADHD combined? Are they often confused —like go to an audiologist and you’ll get the auditory processing Dx, but go to a nueropsych and you’ll get the ADHD Dx? Does a language processing eval help to rule out tolerance fading memory or just help to see if other issues are also present? Can anything mask tolerance fading memory? Is it a 504 or IEP?

Are the completed teacher rating scales viewable under FERPA? Scales were only given to one teacher who spends far less time with my child and school refuses to reissue observation scales to the teacher present for a longer duration of the school day with my child. (Note my child splits classrooms so neither teacher is present with the other one.)

My daughter is in 1st grade and really struggling to read. She has between a half hour to an hour of homework each day. I am concerned at this point in the year with her lack of progress. I wonder if she maybe has dyslexia and the teacher said the school does not worry about the possibility until 3rd grade. Unfortunately, she is struggling NOW. What should I do, and, or, ask for to initiate testing?

My son is in 8th grade and has an IEP for ADHD & SPD. He struggling the first semester with his math teacher and it got to the point where she just wrote him office referrals for lunch detention multiple times a week. It was a toxic environment. His IEP Team and I decided changing teachers at semester would be a good idea and he's now been in the new class for 2 weeks. He's doing great and doing his work, etc. No behavior issues. Still struggles with being on task, distractions and starting assignments. The issue is that this new teacher only grades tests & quizzes, no assignments count towards his grade. Because of his struggles first semester, he's behind in ma…

Looking for guidance...I'm a working mom to a 6 year old who was a micro-preemie diagnosed with cerebral palsy. She has documented learning delays, showing signs of dyslexia, recommended by teacher & special ed to discuss ADHD possibility with doctor (tested at "clinical concern" in school assessment related to attention). Specifically, after receiving therapy services since she was 6 months old and early education starting at 3 years old, she is now in kindergarten and lost all therapies and special education instruction in December 2022. IEP was discontinued because annual review tested for IQ. The IQ and assessment tests were not 20 points apart (per Missouri …

The school is proposing to reduce my child's 1:1 minutes. There is recent behavioral data to support that this is not warranted. An IEP meeting is being scheduled and I just want to make sure I am going about this correctly. If I disagree with the change and ask for a PWN, what are the next steps?

A reader emailed me: My grandson was home schooled Part of last year and part of this year and started back to home school in January and doesn’t want to go back, his anxiety is high and emotions are all over. I feel it I because the program we used didn’t follow the school and he is feeling overwhelmed and lost. I plan on home schooling again. Should I go back to the easier basics so he is more comfortable but am worried he will not keep advancing if he doesn’t put his all in to it. Thoughts?

It has been a long day (month, year) at this school so forgive my bluntness: 11 meetings this year so far (2 kids) and still at least 2 more to go with IEEs 😶😵‍💫😲 Not only have the Generic, drop-box, completely inappropriate crap goals not improved, the newest draft IEP went from 3 crap goals to 1!!!!!! It appears that putting crap goals in IEPs is a great tactic as I have not read one due process case (or met a lawyer willing to take a case) based on crap goals. I am not equipped to write my children’s goals (but will have to learn how to do that too🤷‍♀️🤬🤷‍♀️), but neither is this district ( really Special Services Director in this case as he is the Only …

Hi all. My 11-year-old 5th grader has confirmed diagnoses of ASD (diagnosed age 2) and ADHD Inattentive Type (diagnosed February 2026). He has had a 504 plan in place since the first time we were denied evaluations at all at the end of 3rd grade. We are in Missouri. The district completed an initial special ed evaluation and denied eligibility. I verbally disagreed with the determination in the meeting and did not sign anything. I am on a waiting list for a state advocacy nonprofit with no ETA. We have 23 school days left and he transitions to middle school in the fall. MY QUESTIONS: Does this situation call for requesting an IEE at public expense? I…

In my child's newest IEP it says she is to spend 400 hours weekly in the resource classroom for reading, writing, and math. The school has been doing standardized testing for the past month, and during that time it looks like she's been getting maybe 25 minutes for just math, and not even everyday. I think they use the classroom for testing for some of the kids. Are they allowed to cut down her hours like that for testing? She's missed out on at least 1000 hours of instruction time due to this. I need suggestions on how to approach this. I'm pretty sure they are already mad at me because I pushed back before the IEP (politely, but firmly which they are not used to from me…

Is there a requirement that when doing an evaluation, the child has to have input? School did a sensory evaluation consisting of only the school companion of the Sensory Profile 2, but did not provide the parent or student with any opportunity to participate in the sensory evaluation (10 yo). Is the Sensory Processing Measure a better evaluation? Does anything take into account the child feedback versus solely relying on a teacher to be noticing? Seems a little one-sided if only one person is asked to evaluate for a concern, especially if there's very subtle things happening and kid "flies under the radar". Child is not an obviously distracting kid due to anxiety s…

I have a few questions which I hope the community can answer: Is there a specific timeline for requesting an IEE after the school completes testing? To whom is an IEE request addressed to? The school principal, school district SPED director, state agency? If the IEP goals aren't measurable (and the school was aware,) can I argue for an IEE? My child is moving over to Middle School next school year, should there be a transition meeting which includes the SPED teacher at the new school? Since the SPED teacher stated my child has mastered their goals, is it beneficial to ask for a meeting to have them show m…

I requested during the open house for my daughter to be reevaluated for speech therapy. I hadn't heard anything from the teacher so I recently asked about it. She dated that the speech therapist talked to my daughter and looked at the prior eval and said there still was no need for her to have therapy in school. My daughter is hard to understand at times even for myself and my husband, but she will repeat herself until we understand. My question is, do I push for a full evaluation to be done even if they don't WANT to do it? She is getting therapy outside of the school. I want to make sure she is able to be better understood as she gets older, she is 15 now.

This is an interesting one ... I have just been notified that the TVI is not going to be back for the rest of the year (we have consultations a direct services with goals listed in IEP) . The case manager does not know why this is happening. They are proposing to attach TVI services through an OT handwriting goal. And then amend the IEP in the fall when a new TVI is on board and can assess and develop their own goals. The contracted company also stated they don't have access to the students file and the TVI did not provide input to the new draft iep (annual) My intake thought it , they need to get a TVI replacement , new assessment and create goals but is that realistic…

I have a student undergoing evaluation under OHI due to multiple medical conditions that are limiting participation at school and in general with ADLs. What happens if the school decides to deny certification under OHI but the physician on the MET team completes the form stating they are limited in vitality, etc to the definition under OHI? Our state rules (MI) require a physician to be part of the decision making team. The school has been very set against offering support unless the student is failing.

2e kid (gifted/adhd, 5th grade), has 504 and behavior problems. Initial IEP evaluation (kinder) said he didn't qualify, ups and downs with behavior but overall and upward trend (with outside help) Recent dip and showing a lot of emotion Recent school meeting to tell us all the things that are wrong, bleak picture for middle school, will be suspended soon, the normal grilling to see what we are doing and what 'we' could do better. At the very end, IEP evaluation was suggested by a staff member. Evaluations (we had outside ones too) are very rough on the kid and us. If we felt there was legit support that would help (in addition to our outside help) we'd be m…

We had our middle school articulation meeting as my child (ADHD & 2e, with poor executive function) is going into middle school next year. They said they will keep all my child's accommodations, but not the pull outs because the school "doesn't do that". Is this legal? She has not met her most of her IEP goals. And has definitely the goals for spelling and executive function. She gets pulled out for spelling using Wilsons. Yet her spelling is below grade level and she can not write a 3 sentence paragraph independently on her own. I pointed out her spelling issues and they just replied they don't grade spelling in middle school, so it is not an issue. I disagreed and …

My son has an IEP for speech, which he has mastered, and they have kept him on to get him approved for an OHI IEP. We are in TN, and I have had an increasingly difficult time in our school district with accommodations. He has ASD and was diagnosed with GAD also last year he was diagnosed with a neurological disorder in his colon. He is 7 and not potty trained, which has been a problem with the school. He is in Gen Ed, high functioning and they do not provide any kind of assistance. He is expected to go to the bathroom and take care of all his needs on his own, the problem is he won't. I was told due to the medical conditions he needs a 504 but the school is attempting to …

My child has had a migraine/headache every day since January. She’s missed so much school going back all the way to the start of the year. I finally got the school to do an evaluation after asking twice. 25 school days after I first asked and two meetings after they tried to talk me out of it, they finally sent me the consent to evaluation form. And 32 And 32 school days later, I saw the results. She qualified under Part A of Other Health Disability and met the criteria in Part B/they determine the absences were her academically. But they denied her services. I didn’t get a PWN until three calendar months after the evaluation was complete (May 24 vs Feb 19)…

Hello! My 14 y.o. with ADHD has had an IEP since the 4th grade, largely because of behavioral and social-emotional issues. It was "renewed" for 3 years (last triennial) and covered 6, 7, an 8th grade. Both in 6th and in 7th he had a few suspensions for behavior and at the end of 7th after a 3rd suspension the team suggested we reevaluate him, and I agreed thinking it would translate into MORE support for his social-emotional challenges. However, after they did all the assessments they came back and said he was doing so well academically that they felt he no longer qualified for an IEP to "access the classroom" and wanted to move him to a 504. I disagreed and sent the…

We moved to our 3rd district in TN and they are stating she can't have her personal iPad with her TD Snap app but must use a school issued iPad. IEP from previous district lists her iPad as her speech generating device. In description they specifically mention my daughter "brings her own communication device to school, however the school has a backup device if needed." New school wants to replace personal iPad with school issued iPad after my nonverbal daughter was "caught" taking screenshots of the sentences she created in her own AAC device. ( My daughter is 12 and also has intellectual disabilities and will be further devasted if she can't have her own iPad.) Do …

I need help finding the supporting legal definition of “school-endorsed activity.” As I understood from IDEA 34 C.F.R. §§ 300.320, 300.107, and 300.117, IEPs also cover extracurricular activities as long as the activity is endorsed by school. What is the litmus test to determine if an activity is endorsed by the school? I would appreciate if you could provide as much detail as available for this test as extracurricular activities take so many different shapes and forms. Sometimes the activity is free to the students, sometimes there is a fee but the school allows the group to meet in the school grounds for free or just a symbolic fee, sometimes the activity has…

Hello https://static.xx.fbcdn.net/images/emoji.php/v9/t4c/1/16/1f642.png I have a 13 year old dx ASD & ADHD. School has done their evaluations and since “his grades are good is not going to give him an IEP”. He currently has a 504 and all accomidations are for my son to complete or do. None are for the school or teachers to check in with him to make sure he has understanding and correct paperwork/assignments. School has done speech eval, OT eval for sensory only and psych eval. Speech Evaluation was done virtually, and I feel lacks a lot of social pragmatics data. I Plan to ask for an IEE. Not one but 2 Private evaluations documents social pragmat…

so this is for a close pal so I need to keep this fairly generic but they handed in a IEP eval a request this AM to the district office and then met with the principal to start a 504 this afternoon (their kid needs some emotional support help ASAP) and the principal brought in the school psych and they proceeded to tell the parents that the kid could not qualify as they said he had no learning differences (they must have showed an old IQ test..only an iq test not a full neuropsych) and that they insisted that IEPs are not meant for emotional disabilities, only for academic reason. So I know this is not true..I have two ED kids in this district. The kid's struggles are a…

Posting for a reader: I have a question regarding the transportation for my son that his local public school provides. Last year at the end of the school year my son was attacked by another student on the same van. The student also pulled another child’s hair and also grabbed the van driver’s arm while driving. The other child goes to the same private school as my son but is a student in another school district, but the same county as we live in. The school is not in our county it is about 48 miles each way. The public schools have a contract with a local company to provide bus and van services. So they do not have the transportation hired directly. …