Hawaii Comp Ed Class Action: Don’t Panic. Plan.

Originally posted on our Special Education Law Insights blog.

And so it begins. While we have encouraged schools to focus on meeting student needs during the school closure and planning to meet student needs when we return to school buildings, we knew the temptation to jump ahead to compensatory education questions would be strong. Guidance documents from the U.S. Department of Education and ISBE have contributed to such concerns by stating that IEP teams will need to make individual compensatory education determinations for students when school resumes. Now, a putative class action lawsuit has been filed in Hawaii. The suit alleges that Hawaii denied students FAPE by failing to implement their IEPs during the school closure and seeks to establish a set of parameters and procedures to identify and address lost educational opportunities for students. While class action lawsuits and the specter of numerous due process complaints raise our collective blood pressure, we continue to advise that schools focus on doing their best to provide reasonable services to meet individual student needs, communicate with parents, and document, document, document. These actions will prepare schools to address requests for compensatory services if and when they come.

Read more on our Special Education Law Insights blog.