IDEA Legal Requirements for Discipline
From the September 2001 Education newsletter.
Since the passage of IDEA 1997, school officials have been faced with new discipline guidelines for students with disabilities. As with typically developing students, administrators walk a fine line balancing the rights of individual students with the need to maintain a safe environment for all students. The web page of OSEP offers a rundown of guidelines that educators should follow when disciplining students with disabilities. They've given us permission to pass this on to our subscribers.
Legal Requirements Under the Law
In the IDEA Amendments of 1997, Congress recognized that in certain instances, school personnel needed increased flexibility to deal with safety issues while maintaining needed due process protections in the IDEA.
What the Law Allows: Procedural Considerations:
- School personnel can remove a student with a disability for 10 consecutive school days or less at a time for a violation of the school code of conduct (to the same extent applied to children without disabilities). School personnel can immediately remove for up to 10 consecutive school days or less, the same child for separate incidences of misconduct.
- School personnel can also order a change of placement of a child with a disability to an appropriate interim alternative educational setting for up to 45 days for possession of weapons or drugs or the solicitation or sale of controlled substances while at school and school functions.
- If school personnel believe that a child is dangerous to him or herself or others, they can ask a hearing officer in an expedited due process hearing to remove a student to an interim alternative educational setting for up to 45 days.
- 45 day interim alternative educational placements can be extended in additional 45-day increments if the hearing officer agrees that the child continues to be substantially likely to injure himself or herself or others if returned to his or her prior placement.
- School personnel can remove a child with a disability, including suspending or expelling for behavior that is not a manifestation of the child's disability, to the same extent as is done for children without disabilities, for the same behavior.
- School personnel can report crimes to appropriate law enforcement and judicial authorities.
- School personnel can always ask a court for a temporary restraining order in order to protect children or adults from harmful behaviors.
For more information on discipline and behavioral support for students with disabilities, see The Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services' web site.
