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Part I: Surviving the IEP ProcessBy Penny Reeder For many parents, Individualized Education Program (IEP) meetings are stressful events. They can make little kids feel bad about themselves and preteens cultivate an attitude of bored detachment long before their educationally able-bodied peers have considered adopting that demeanor. And an IEP meeting can undermine, even in its contemplation, every bit of self-confidence parents have managed to accumulate about their parenting abilities, their disciplinary strategies, or their rightful place in society. Oh, I know, the educators and administrators on the team that will determine your child’s future and pass judgment on his or her current successes and “needs,” the legislators and policy-makers who write the enabling laws and regulations, the school psychologists, and the speech and language professionals – all of them will claim that an IEP meeting is not designed to stress out either the student, who is the object of the team’s scrutiny, or his or her parents. But just ask any student destined for the annual evaluation. An IEP meeting can, by comparison, make bringing home a bad report card seem like a day at the beach. It’s no fun to be the object of investigation, interrogation, justification, recrimination or intimidation. There’s no kid who doesn’t realize what the “special” in his or her special education classification actually means, i.e., that he or she has failed to measure up to some universally understood definition of “normal.” Even the youngest child realizes that a meeting is being convened to address what’s wrong with him or with her. Who wouldn’t long for the blessed anonymity of “normal?” And how do parents feel about being a member of the team? In my case, my first IEP meeting for Alex, our second-grade son – before the Education for All Handicapped Children Act was superseded by IDEA, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act -- really felt like a team effort. We were all on the same side: my son’s side. Alex, at 7, had had two years of preschool, a year of kindergarten, another in first grade, and half a year in the second grade with the kindest, most enthusiastic teachers. But despite a nurturing home environment, countless hours of interventions by speech and occupational therapists and reading specialists, plus trips to pediatricians and neurologists to investigate, calibrate and remediate, my son was just not catching on to reading. Writing was also an issue: He hated picking up a pencil, and the letters he so laboriously scratched onto the bold-lined paper weren’t very legible. Spelling homework had become our own special brand of nightly torture. And our bright, sunny Alex wasn’t feeling very good about himself anymore. That meeting, at which everyone around the table talked about my son’s gifts and skills and the brightness of his future if we could devise the right plan and include the right professionals, was, I now know, the exception rather than the rule. That team reached exactly the right decisions for our son, including having him transferred to a school outside his home district, where a special bus picked him up. As a member of a class of six, and with the patient and enlightened intervention of a woman who may be the most gifted special educator in the history of the world, Alex learned to read. His teacher found ways for him to express himself that didn’t require coloring inside the lines, and the plan we had devised around that conference table, with each of us working so hard to meet my child’s needs, was a success. Other planning meetings followed. None was as amiable or as energizing as that first meeting, at which we all strove so hard to meet the spirit of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act. Alex went on to a different school, spent more time in the mainstream, and eventually was fully included in the education process. Once his teacher flipped that magic switch that allowed him to catch on to reading, he was off and running, reading everything in sight, and eventually beginning to experience all the benefits of what was then relatively new computer processing technology. A grown-up now and the father of two children of his own, computers have become his career. He still reads for pleasure and work and – I hope -- feels pretty good about himself and his accomplishments. My subsequent experiences with IEP meetings, especially after the 1990 passage of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and writing of its ensuing regulations, were not nearly so energizing or agreeable. Alex was the first of our four boys to be identified as “learning disabled.” Although, as a group, they share a collection of strengths and needs – all have characteristics similar to their father who, had he been born in the 1960s instead of the 1940s, would probably have been labeled “learning disabled” – each approaches life and learning with his own “spin.” Perhaps IDEA, with its percentages in the mainstream, performance psychometrics, and endless rehashing of goals, hasn’t been as successful as prior laws at treating parents as full partners in their children’s special education or at improving children’s ability to feel good about themselves. The climate the law has created is, by design, an adversarial one, and a child’s entrance into the special education system is contingent upon his or her failure in the “regular ed” classroom. Who knows why some of our IEP team encounters have been affirming and even energizing, while others have been confrontational and exhausting? Certainly the make-up of the team plays a role. Here’s an example: I once told my son’s seventh-grade special educator that Zach’s problems stemmed in part from feeling overwhelmed and having trouble remembering what he was expected to do for homework. When the teacher replied: “Your son doesn’t have any problems with his memory. He can remember when his birthday is,” I knew the meeting would go downhill from there. Sometimes the team’s demeanor seems to be related to the current fiscal predisposition of the district. When our team met to find a way to help Alex maximize his potential, there was an excitement in the air about special education, providing accommodations, and meeting the needs of every child in the district; the local economy was relatively prosperous; and that first generation of Baby Boomer parents truly believed in the cost-benefit ratios associated with giving every child the best possible education the school system could provide. But 10 years later, in the midst of a recession and tax revolts by frustrated homeowners, and with the population of children being identified as “special” escalating, the teams we met with chose to ignore even the neuropsychological evidence of our child’s learning disabilities: It cost less to label him a kid with a “speech and language” disability than one with a learning disability. A few years later, an investigative reporter discovered that the county had consciously decided, at that time, to deny children appropriate accommodations, believing that it was more cost effective to deny children their rights and risk lawsuits from frustrated families than to seek placements where children could receive the services they needed. The school system was betting that most parents would, once denied services, take “no” for an answer and not bother to hire advocates, go to hearings, or invoke their rights under the law and sue. (We did go to a hearing and win an out-of-district placement for our child, but the consequences in terms of emotional and financial distress caused a lot of turmoil in our lives and our relationships.) Still, Zach got a great education at a school that specialized in working with children with learning disabilities. Today, he is happily employed, with friends and hobbies and a good life. My experience has been that most IEP meetings fall somewhere in the middle of the spectrum, with the professionals going through the motions, taking the notes, listening dutifully to the teachers’ reports, asking the children what they think they need, and placating parents with vague platitudes about their children’s “redeeming qualities.” Then signatures are gathered, goals are cast, percentages are changed, performance quantifications are derived, and children and parents slump out of the meeting sometimes with hope, occasionally with dread, usually not having secured nearly the educational results they had hoped for. Now that fall is here, children have returned to their classrooms, and 30- or 60-day reviews are just around the corner, it’s time again to rearm ourselves for the coming meetings of the assembled IEP teams. I have asked parents, advocates and educators for their best advice about surviving the coming meetings. I will review those in part II of this article in the next issue. *********** Penny Reeder lives in Montgomery Village, Md. Blind because of the consequences of Retinopathy of Prematurity (ROP), she currently works as a rehabilitation teacher for Maryland’s Office of Blindness and Vision Services. She and her husband are the parents of six children and the grandparents of three. PLEASE NOTE: PORTIONS OF THIS WEB SITE ARE UNDER CONSTRUCTION! |
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