Wrightslaw

At Wrightslaw, our goals are to help you gain the information and skills you need to navigate the changing world of special education.

Highlights: How to disagree with the IEP team without starting WW III; child successfully completed all courses, denied a diploma; cool tool - SchoolMatters; IDEA regs on fast track, expected in June; self-advocacy and resources to help college kids; scholarships for students with disabilities; Wrightslaw: IDEA 2004 available soon; Wrightslaw coming to Hawaii.

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Download this issue. Newsletters published in 2005

As IEP season continues, many parents have questions about what to do when they are presented with an IEP that is not appropriate for their child. Pete Wright has some suggestions:

"You should advise the IEP team that you don’t think the IEP is appropriate, that it does not provide your child with enough help or the right kind of help. You should use facts to support your position (i.e., facts from an evaluation of your child from a private sector evaluator, graphs of your child's test scores).

Be polite but firm. Think how Miss Manners handles difficult situations and use this to guide you."

In How to Disagree with the IEP Team, Pete Wright answers your questions about IEPs and how to disagree with the IEP team without starting a war. Learn about the Rules of Adverse Assumptions, how to use tape recordings and thank you letters to clarify issues, and how to deal with an IEP team bully. Read article.

More articles by Pete & Pam Wright.

"My daughter just finished high school. She passed all courses in grades K-12. She did not pass the the state exam in English. She will not get a high school diploma."

"What message are we sending? We are telling children who worked hard and attended schooled for 13 years that this means nothing. What can be done? Have lawsuits been successful?"

Your daughter must be devastated.

Yes, there have been successful lawsuits about high stakes testing and graduation. Most were class action suits that settled before children were denied diplomas. High-Stakes Testing News

Pete says high-stakes testing is the The Next Wave of Special Education Litigation.

You need a plan that you can implement now. In Exit Exams Can Be Optional If You Plan Ahead, Sue Heath describes a simple strategy that will allow your daughter to graduate with a high school diploma - with or without a graduation ceremony. Then she can get on with her life.

Sue writes about creative advocacy strategies in her column, Doing Your Homework, which appears in The Special Ed Advocate and on Wrightslaw.com.

As the co-author of Wrightslaw: No Child Left Behind, Sue speaks to groups of parents, advocates, and educators about No Child Left Behind, reading, research based instruction and strategies for using federal education standards to advocate for children and to improve public schools. Learn more

The main goal of No Child Left Behind is that all students will be proficient in reading and math by the end of 3rd grade. NCLB was enacted in 2001 - what percentage of kids in your state are proficient in reading and math now?

If you have a minute or two, go to SchoolMatters.com. Select your state. Your state's page has education facts and information about how students performed on state tests of reading and math. If you scroll down a bit, you'll see another set of scores - how students performed on national tests of reading and math. When we went to the page for Virginia, we were surprised at the difference between the state and national percentages of children who are proficient in reading and math.

Proficiency on State Tests
Reading Proficiency: 74.8%
Math Proficiency: 76.8%

Proficiency on National Tests
Grade 4 Reading Proficiency: 35%
Grade 8 Reading Proficiency: 36%
Grade 4 Math Proficiency: 36%
Grade 8 Math Proficiency: 31%

Grade 4 Reading Proficiency: 74.8% - or 35%?
Grade 4 Math Proficiency: 76.8% - or 36%?

How can there be such huge differences on tests of reading and math proficiency? Are the state tests too easy? Are the national tests too hard? We need to find the answers to these questions. If your child attends public school, you probably need to find answers to these questions too.

SchoolMatters provides data about student performance, demographics, and resource centers for parents, educators, district leaders, and state leaders. You can even compare states (handy if you are planning to move)

SchoolMatters is service of Standard & Poors. Why SchoolMatters says, "Despite a 50 percent increase in per pupil spending over the past two decades, nearly one third of public high school students fail to graduate, and two thirds of all students leave high school unprepared for a four-year college . . . SchoolMatters gives policymakers, educators, and parents the tools they need to make better-informed decisions that improve student performance."

We can't argue with that mission! (But we do need to find out how many 4th and 8th graders our state are proficient in reading and math . . .)

If you are interested in school improvement, the New Hampshire Branch of the International Dyslexia Association has a fantastic databank of resources on this topic.

College-bound students need to learn self-advocacy skills - how to present information about their disability and accommodations so professors want to help. If students master these skills, they are more likely to make a successful transition from high school to college.

Resources in our Help for College Students with Disabilities Flyer are divided into three categories:

* Rights and Responsibilities under Section 504
* Planning and Preparation
* Keys to Success

"My son has a learning disability. He worked hard and has been accepted into a college. Do you know of any scholarships that can help pay for his education? We still have two kids at home and are financially strapped."

The New Hampshire branch of the International Dyslexia Association (IDA) has a list of scholarships for students with disabilities.

FinAid has information about financial aid for students with disabilities, including scholarships and fellowships.

The U. S. Department of Education offers information about financial aid and how to apply for scholarships and loans. The "Student Portal" has info about how to find and pay for college.