If your child has serious behaviors (such as elopement, fights, disrupting class or hurting themselves) that interfere with their learning or another child’s ability to learn or have caused their placement in a general education classroom or less restrictive educational setting to be at risk, you should make a written request for an IEP meeting to determine which assessments and supports and services your child needs to address their behavior in a positive way. Services that the IEP team should consider include a detailed functional behavioral assessment, a behavior support plan, and if appropriate, a positive behavior intervention plan, a one-to-one behavioral aide, parent/guardian/other education rights holder and/or teacher training and consultation with a behavior specialist, counseling, social skills, anger management, and/or other services and strategies that you believe your child needs.
Before the IEP meeting, you may want to make a written request for a functional behavioral assessment, especially if the school has developed a behavioral support plan or used other behavioral strategies that have not worked to improve your child’s challenging behavior. This assessment should be designed to obtain detailed information about your child’s behavior (such as a detailed description of the behavior, how often it happens, how long it lasts, where it happens, and what happens just before and after your child engages in the challenging behavior) and your child’s learning environments to help the IEP team determine why your child is engaging in challenging behavior and what can be done about it.
The school has 60 days from when you sign an assessment plan that includes a functional behavioral assessment to perform the assessment and to hold another IEP meeting to discuss the results of the assessment and to determine what services, supports and other positive behavior strategies your child needs.[1]
If the school district conducts a Functional Behavior Assessment of your child but you do not think the assessment is helpful in determining what kinds of behavioral supports or services your child needs, or you disagree with the school district’s assessment for other reasons, we recommend that you request an independent educational evaluation (IEE) at public expense.[2]
You should make this request in writing to the school district and try to explain the specific parts of the assessment or the methods used to conduct the assessment that you disagree with. If you make a request for an IEE, the district is required by law to either agree to pay for this assessment or file for a due process hearing to show that the district’s assessment is “appropriate.”[3]
- Cal. Ed. Code Sec. 56344(a)[↩]
- 34 C.F.R. Sec. 300.502; Cal. Ed. Code Sec. 56329(b).[↩]
- 34 C.F.R. Sec. 300.502; Cal. Ed. Code Sec. 56329(b); see Chapter 15, Information on the Rights of Students with Behavioral Needs and Students Who are Bullied.[↩]