IDEA Complaint Decision 16-032

On April 26, 2016, the Department of Public Instruction (department) received a complaint under state and federal special education law from XXXXX against the Racine Unified School District. This is the department’s decision regarding that complaint. The issue is whether the district, during the 2015-16 school year, properly responded to an adult student’s request for an individualized education program (IEP) team meeting.

In January 2016, the adult student requested an IEP team meeting to review and revise the student’s IEP. An adult student with a disability has the right to request an IEP team meeting at any time, and the district should grant any reasonable request for an IEP team meeting. If the district denies the request for an IEP team meeting, the district must provide the adult student with a notice of refusal in writing. The notice must include an explanation of why the district refuses to grant the request. The district denied the request but did not provide a notice and an explanation as to why the request was denied. On May 3, 2016, after the student filed this complaint, the district conducted an IEP team meeting and reevaluation. In the May 3 IEP team meeting, the district acknowledged that it did not properly respond to the student’s request for an IEP team meeting. No student specific corrective action is required. Within 30 days from the date of this decision, the district must develop a corrective action plan to ensure the district properly responds to a request for an IEP team meeting.

All noncompliance identified above must be corrected as soon as possible, but in no case more than one year from the date of this decision. This concludes our review of this complaint. 

//signed CST 6/21/2016
Carolyn Stanford Taylor
Assistant State Superintendent
Division for Learning Support

Dec/jfd