At the IEP meeting, the attorney should endeavor to work collaboratively with the school-based members of the IEP team and keep the focus on the student’s needs.1 In many cases, emotions may run high due to a long history of acrimonious interactions between the parent and the school that preceded the attorney’s involvement. While an attorney must firmly defend the client’s interests, modeling professionalism and directing the focus of the conversation towards finding forward-looking solutions to the issues rather than assigning blame for past failures can be critical to obtaining the desired outcome. Additionally, the attorney and parent should avoid talking about the student’s “best interests” or what is “best” for the student because the legal basis for evaluating special education is whether a student’s program provides an appropriate education.
Although every member of the IEP team, including and especially the parent, has a voice and is able to provide input at IEP meetings, the IEP team is not a democracy. Ideally, the IEP team will arrive at decisions related to the IEP through consensus, but in Louisiana it is the LEA’s Officially Designated Representative (“ODR”) who ultimately determines what goes into an IEP. While a parent’s consent in the form of a signature on the consent page on the initial IEP is needed in order for special education services to begin, no such consent is needed for subsequent annual IEPs.2 As a result, a parent’s refusal to sign an IEP has no legal effect for the annual IEP, which becomes the official IEP when submitted through the state’s Special Education Reporting (“SER”) System.3
Despite the concentration of power being decidedly one-sided when it comes to IEP teams, the mere presence of an attorney can be helpful to the chances of reaching agreement and attaining desired outcomes for the parent at an IEP meeting. School officials understand that the involvement of an attorney increases the chances of having to deal with costly and time-consuming formal dispute resolution if no agreement is reached. Even more importantly, the involvement of an attorney often leads to the involvement of school officials with greater training and expertise and results in a more formal IEP meeting where more care is taken to consider parent input. A parent who is used to IEP meetings being brief encounters with a special education teacher and possibly one other school administrator at which the parent’s concerns are quickly dismissed may marvel that the first IEP meeting with an attorney may last for several hours, have in attendance nearly a dozen school-level and central-office level officials, and involve everyone at the table taking time to listen to and understand the parent’s concerns. Providing a platform for a parent’s voice to be heard is sometimes all that is needed for effective IEP advocacy.
- 1For tips on how to advocate effectively at IEP meetings, see Erin Han, et al., Special Education Advocacy at School Meetings, Am. Bar Ass’n (Jan. 9, 2012); Advocacy Tips for IEP Meetings, Disability Rts. S.C.; 17 Special Education Advocacy Tips, Disability Rts. Cal. (June 1, 2020).
- 2See La. Dep’t of Educ., Individualized Education Program Form 14.
- 3See La. Dep’t of Educ., Special Education Reporting IEP Forms User Guide (Feb. 2021).