Thursday, March 5, 2009

Contact with the Department of Education in DC

I've spoken with a person at the US Department of Education in Washington DC and they are interested in these cases because 1) under IDEA section C the state is required to provide these services and 2) the state is recieving federal funding from them.

She advised me that there are a few things that we have to do before we can file a formal complaint for them to officially investigate:

1. Contact DDD representative and/or hotline, point out that your child's IFSP lists services they are supposed to be recieving , apparently this is a legally binding document, also advise them that you have not recieved a written notice of discontinuation which is your right according to their procedural safeguards, record their response, name, date, time and what agency they were through. If they deny services or if they don't call back document your attempts to contact them, also document name date and time of your discussions with any service providers and their reporting to you they are discontinuing services per DDD even though IFSP goals have not been met and you have not recieved written notice

2. Call your local AzEIP office, tell them your services have been discontinued and IFSP goals have not been met, and request to file a complaint, and request your right to appeal, record who you talk to and what they say, names, dates and times.

3. Once this is done and if you don't get any results, contact the US Department of Education in DC and file a formal complaintThe reason we have to go through these steps is because they want concrete evidence that the act has been blatently violated before they can step in, apparently this is also a civil rights issue as well and they want a lot of specifics before they can charge the state with civil rights violations. I'm working on it now, let me know how it goes, and I'll keep you posted too.

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