In a vote taken April 1, 2009, all 30 of the committee members of the Joint Committee on Education present and voting voted in favor of SB 1142, An Act Concerning State Mandates on School Districts (two members were absent). However, substitute bill language was adopted by the committee addressing only the issue of the […]
Educators and other interested parties may wish to contact the Education Committee of the Connecticut General Assembly to express support for SB 1142, An Act Concerning Relief of State Mandates on School Districts. Among other provisions, this bill would finally bring Connecticut in line with other states and with the 2005 United States Supreme Court decision […]
The October 31, 2008 memorandum issued by Anne Louise Thompson, Bureau Chief for Special Education, bears a second reading this time of year as districts prepare to submit excess cost grant applications for the spring of 2009. The memo, issued in the fall, caused shock waves in the special education community initially, as directors absorbed the […]
For our special education administrator friends, figuring out how to comply with the state and federal special education regulations and proving that to the Bureau of Special Education is no easy task. Just when you think you have all the rules figured out, the “interpreters” of the regulations manage to invent new requirements. So, a couple of tips culled […]
A decision recently issued by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in J.G. v. Douglas County School District, 108 LRP 71106 (9th Cir. 2008), calls into question the validity of relying on the 45-school-day evaluation timeline in the state special education regulations for the completion of an initial special education evaluation as “reasonable”. In this case, […]
Effective December 31, 2008, parents will be able to revoke consent for special education services and school districts will not be able to challenge the decision through mediation or due process. In their comments to the new regulations, United States Department of Education officials explained that they believe that the right to revoke consent for […]
In a recent decision, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit (NY, VT, CT) formally joined its sister circuit courts in adopting a standard for determining when a school district has fulfilled its responsibility to educate a student with disabilities in the least restrictive environment (LRE). In P. v. Newington Board of Education (10/9/08), […]
The newly proposed administrative regulations from the State Department of Education on the subject of seclusion and restraint of special education students were published in the Connecticut Law Journal on July 15, 2008, so they are now officially open for public comment for a 30-day period until August 15, 2008. A public hearing has also been […]
If you have the patience to click on each individual numerical link on the State Department of Education website under Special Education Due Process Hearing Decisions, you too may be able to discern the following statistics from the 2007 hearing decisions. These numbers are based on only those cases filed in 2007 that were also […]
If the last few days are any indication, it promises to be a busy season for the General Assembly, particularly at the Committee on Education. Multiple bills have been raised in both the Senate and the House pertaining to education of school-age children, and most of these have been referred to the Education committee. While […]
