Individualized Education Program

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An Individualized Education Program (IEP) is a federally designated plan that supports a student's needs for special education services and other programs based on a diagnosis for a disability included in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). While the qualifying criteria for an IEP are more stringent than a 504 plan, IEPs offer specialized alternative education options rather than accommodations to aid in participation in standard classroom environments.

The IEP Document

IEPs are documents that are created and maintained by each student's IEP team. The program outlines:

• Services provided to the student
• The "goal" of the IEP for student success
• Student learning performance information in relationship to the IEP goal

An IEP team includes:

• Parent(s) or guardian(s)
• The student, if 15 years old or older
• A general education teacher
• A special education teacher
• A district representative
• Other members invited at the discression of the district with permission of parents, such as occupational therapists or speech therapists
• The student's English as a Second Language (ESL) teacher, if applicable

Eligibility Criteria

To qualify for an IEP, a child must have a distinct diagnoses in accordance with a condition named in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which are:

• Autism
• Deaf-Blindness
• Deafness
• Emotional Disturbance
• Hearing Impairment
• Intellectual Disability
• Multiple Disabilities
• Orthopedic Impairment
• Other Health Impairment
• Specific Learning Disability
• Speech or Language Impairment
• Traumatic Brain Injury
• Visual Impairment including Blindness

Note that children can qualify for IEPs with temporary conditions, such as a traumatic brain injury that requires special education modifications during recovery.

This terminology is used within IDEA, which also includes definitions that are important as guidelines for eligibility. The definitions frequently use the term "adversely affects educational performance", but a child does not need to be failing to receive services. Section 300.101(c)(1) of IDEA requires states to provide appropriate special education services "even if the child has not failed or been held back a course or grade, and is advancing from grade to grade as standard."

Autism

In IDEA, autism is defined as "a developmental disability significantly affecting verbal and nonverbal communication and social interaction, generally evident before age three, that adversely affects a child’s educational performance. Other characteristics often associated with autism are engaging in repetitive activities and stereotyped movements, resistance to environmental change or change in daily routines, and unusual responses to sensory experiences. The term autism does not apply if the child’s educational performance is adversely affected primarily because the child has an emotional disturbance, as defined below. A child who shows the characteristics of autism after age 3 could be diagnosed as having autism if the criteria above are satisfied.

Deaf-Blindness

In IDEA, deaf-blindness means "concomitant hearing and visual impairments, the combination of which causes such severe communication and other developmental and educational needs that they cannot be accommodated in special education programs solely for children with deafness or children with blindness."

Deafness

Deafness is "a hearing impairment that is so severe that the child is impaired in processing linguistic information through hearing, with or without amplification, that adversely affects a child’s educational performance."

Emotional Disturbance

Emotional disturbance is defined as a condition exhibiting one or more of the following characteristics over a long period of time and to a marked degree that adversely affects a child's educational performance:

1. An inability to learn that cannot be explained by intellectual, sensory, or health factors.
2. An inability to build or maintain satisfactory interpersonal relationships with peers and teachers.
3. Inappropriate types of behavior or feelings under normal circumstances.
4. A general pervasive mood of unhappiness or depression.
5. A tendency to develop physical symptoms or fears associated with personal or school problems.

Emotional disturbance includes schizophrenia. The term does not apply to children who are socially maladjusted, unless it is determined that they have an emotional disturbance under number 3 of this section.

Hearing Impairment

Hearing impairment means "an impairment in hearing, whether permanent or fluctuating, that adversely affects a child’s educational performance but that is not included under the definition of deafness in this section."

Intellectual Disability

Intellectual disability is defined as "significantly subaverage general intellectual functioning, existing concurrently with deficits in adaptive behavior and manifested during the developmental period, that adversely affects a child’s educational performance."

Multiple Disabilities

Multiple disabilities is defined as "concomitant impairments (such as intellectual disability-blindness or intellectual disability-orthopedic impairment), the combination of which causes such severe educational needs that they cannot be accommodated in special education programs solely for one of the impairments." Multiple disabilities does not include deaf-blindness.

Orthopedic Impairment

Orthopedic impairment is defined as "a severe orthopedic impairment that adversely affects a child’s educational performance. The term includes impairments caused by a congenital anomaly, impairments caused by disease (e.g., poliomyelitis, bone tuberculosis), and impairments from other causes (e.g., cerebral palsy, amputations, and fractures or burns that cause contractures)."

Other Health Impairment

Other health impairment means "having limited strength, vitality, or alertness, including a heightened alertness to environmental stimuli, that results in limited alertness with respect to the educational environment." This can be due to chronic or acute health problems, including asthma, attention deficit disorder or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, diabetes, epilepsy, a heart condition, hemophilia, lead poisoning, leukemia, nephritis, rheumatic fever, sickle cell anemia, and Tourette syndrome. To qualify under "Other Health Impairment", this impairment must also adversely affect a child’s educational performance.

Specific Learning Disability

Specific learning disabilities mean "a disorder in one or more of the basic psychological processes involved in understanding or in using language, spoken or written, that may manifest itself in the imperfect ability to listen, think, speak, read, write, spell, or to do mathematical calculations, including conditions such as perceptual disabilities, brain injury, minimal brain dysfunction, dyslexia, and developmental aphasia." This category does not include learning problems that are primarily the result of visual, hearing, motor, or intellectual disabilities, of emotional disturbance, or of environmental, cultural, or economic disadvantage.

Speech or Language Impairment

Speech or language impairment is "a communication disorder, such as stuttering, impaired articulation, a language impairment, or a voice impairment, that adversely affects a child’s educational performance."

Traumatic Brain Injury

Traumatic brain injury is "an acquired injury to the brain caused by an external physical force, resulting in total or partial functional disability or psychosocial impairment, or both, that adversely affects a child’s educational performance. Traumatic brain injury applies to open or closed head injuries resulting in impairments in one or more areas, such as cognition; language; memory; attention; reasoning; abstract thinking; judgment; problem-solving; sensory, perceptual, and motor abilities; psychosocial behavior; physical functions; information processing; and speech. Traumatic brain injury does not apply to brain injuries that are congenital or degenerative, or to brain injuries induced by birth trauma."

Visual Impairment

Visual impairment includes both partial sight and blindness, and means "an impairment in vision that, even with correction, adversely affects a child’s educational performance."

Evaluation

Main article: Special Education Evaluation

Children may be identified or referred to special education evaluation through a variety of processes. PPS participates in the "Child Find" requirement, which can lead to identification and evaluation independent of parent request for evaluation. The parent can also request a special education evaluation verbally or in writing to a student's teacher, counselor, or administrator.

An evaluation planning meeting will be held at the parent's request. Officially, this requires a written request, but parents are encouraged to have a conversation with the student's teacher or another administrator.

Services Offered

As IEPs are specialized for each student, there are a variety of service delivery models that can possibly be offered depending on the student's needs. IEPs vary in setting, intensity, and instructional content.

• Setting is the amount of time a student is educated in the standard classroom compared to the amount of time that the student receives specialized services in a special education environment.
• Intensity is the amount of aids and services that a student receives.
• Instructional content is what the child is taught. The IEP indicates where each student is performing in relation to grade level standards and describes how the child should progress towards those standards.

These services can be delivered in different assignments and settings. Since 2023, there have been some modifications to this with the implementation of the Neighborhood Schools Model, but this is a gradual roll out so it may not currently apply. PPS attempts to deliver SpEd services at the student's local school when possible.

In addition, some IEPs will indicate that a student should be assigned to a focused service school with different types of classroom models focused on specific schools. PPS outlines how these schools work on their website, but the modalities include:

• Learning centers
• Social emotional skills classrooms
• Communication behavior classrooms
• Intensive skills center classrooms
• Special schools
• Home instruction