An IEP is what follows an evaluation. After the screening comes the evaluation and
after the evaluation comes eligibility then IEP. “The Individualized Education Program (or
IEP) lays out the school’s commitment to provide special education and related
services to eligible students. Each eligible student must have an IEP in effect
before he or she can receive special education and related service”
I like to remind my parents that the school is under federal
law to provide these services therefore if they are not providing the services
that the child on the IEP deserves/requires to make educational gains then they
are breaking the law. Parents feel that
the school and their employees are the ones in charge when they go the annual IEP
meeting because it is held at the school and after all “they are the
professionals”.
It is true that it is the schools responsibility to provide
the services but it is the parent’s responsibility to ensure that the services
are being provided. In a perfect world
everybody would just do what is right but what happens many times is that
people just do what is easiest. After
all we are all just human, I am sure everybody at times does this however when
the school is doing this the school and its employees are directly affecting
your child and his/hers education.
My purpose in making this blog is to create a resource to
empower parents with information so they will not become a parent that says “if
I knew then what I knew now my child would be better off”. Those are heart breaking words, words that I
do not want any of my parents that I work with to say and this blog is my
feeble attempt to prevent those words from being spoken. Parents often learn the hard way how IEP’s
work and therefore their children suffer.
Here is a pamphlet I found that has a lot of good general information
about what parents should know if their child has an IEP. Also here is another short article that spells out IEP's and lays out some of the laws that parents need to know about.
If you like what you read please feel free to follow to receive
the latest posts to your email account or use the social bookmark buttons below to post to popular social sites like twitter and facebook.