Moving to another school district. What happens to IEP

[Anonymous]

We are currently privately placed by our VA school district (or officially called contacted services on the IEP). We are looking at possibly moving to another school district within VA. Would the new school district have to honor our child’s private placement? Or could we argue for our current district to continue pay.. do they have any legal obligation? Has anyone done this or know how this works? My guess is the new school would want to do their own eval and this would probably be an uphill battle. Our child is thriving at their private school, so we would not want to risk losing their placement. Any insight would be appreciated!

[Anonymous]

no. it all turns on the new school district's generosity with private placement and that varies greatly by school district. Call the new one and try to get someone competent on the phone to answer the question but, frankly, if you are a layperson (im a special ed lawyer and sit on private boards) you may want to hire an Ed lawyer in the new school district to broker this because noncompliance is the first avenue out for most publics in america. good luck

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:no. it all turns on the new school district's generosity with private placement and that varies greatly by school district. Call the new one and try to get someone competent on the phone to answer the question but, frankly, if you are a layperson (im a special ed lawyer and sit on private boards) you may want to hire an Ed lawyer in the new school district to broker this because noncompliance is the first avenue out for most publics in america. good luck

Thank you!! This is very helpful

[Anonymous]

If you move, no the current school system will not continue to pay and its on the new school system and you'd have to talk to them.

[Anonymous]

No you can't move somewhere else and still attend a school based in your previous district's service.

That's what a district is.

[Anonymous]

The receiving school district has an obligation to continue to provide services that meet the IEP, until they convene to write a new one. If your kid's IEP says that he will be in an out of general ed setting 100% of the time, then they need to figure out how to make that happen, but IEPs don't name schools, or specify private vs public settings. So, they can choose a special education classroom within their public schools.

[Anonymous]

Wrightslaw.com should have some information. There are differences between moving within the state and out of state.

Here is another source. https://ldaamerica.org/info/ieps-and-school-transfers/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No you can't move somewhere else and still attend a school based in your previous district's service.

That's what a district is.

OP here…We are currently privately placed.. ie our school district pays for our child’s speciality private school due to not being able to meet their needs at our public school. We would not be asking to stay at a school within our current school district but being asking to stay at our current private school


Thank you for all the helpful comments. Sounds like it’s pretty risky. We have an attorney that we worked with when we sought private placement so will reach out to them as well.

[Anonymous]

Sorry for typos!

[Anonymous]

The new district has to provide "comparable services" while they do their own evaluations/write their own IEP. It really depends on what self contained programming the new district offers, their attitude toward nonpublic, and how borderline your child's need for nonpublic is.

But under no circumstances would the old district have any obligation to continue to pay for your child's education once you don't live there.

[Anonymous]

No, if the new district says they can meet the needs through their own placements and services they won’t. You’d have to go through documentation and prove again that it’s not working.

Short of a free house or a new job where mortgage savings/pay raise were more than enough to pay for private school out of pocket, I’m not sure why you’d risk it.

[Anonymous]

It really depends. I've worked at a nonpublic school, and districts typically continued private placements if a student moved to a new district - they sometimes reevaluated at the next IEP meeting. It depends on the needs and the district.

[Anonymous]

The new district is obligated to provide the IEP services of move-in students as long as the IEP and eligibility are current. They are also obligated to provide a “like placement” while they do their own evaluation. That said, I just facilitated the placement of a student who had a very robust IEP and the placement was a “non-public” school with lots of support staff. The receiving district interpreted the placement as “like” to an existing program and did not consider not non-public options until it became clear that the existing program was not enough support for the student, which took months of chaos and dysregulation. My advice is to make sure all of the support your student needs is written in the IEP as goals, accommodations or modifications and not just part of the narrative (present levels) or any auxiliary plans like a BSP. Don’t give the new district any room to interpret what your kid needs. Additionally, make sure the new district uses the same eligibility categories—some do not recognize multiple eligibilities.

[Anonymous]

School based slp here.
My advice would be to contact the central special education office. Dont enroll your child in the neighborhood school and leave it to the school basedteam.
When we have a new general ed student with an iep at my school, we meet with the parents and adopt the iep as is and schedule a 45 or 60 day review.
But for students not in general ed, it's much more complicated.
In my district, the final decision of an outside placement (even one within the district) is above the discretion of our school based team. We make LRE (least restrictive environment) statements, write appropriate goals, put in appropriate service hours, write detailed reports with standardized scores, skill levels, behaviors, etc. We load up the IEP and put in accomodations and recommendations that should make it very clear that a general ed setting is not the LRE. All in the hopes of giving a student what they need but the decision comes from outside/above our school team. Once a student is at our school, it takes months and many meetings and that is for a placement within the district. For a private placement, the public options have to be exhausted.
TLDR: go straight to "central office" not through your neighborhood school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:School based slp here.
My advice would be to contact the central special education office. Dont enroll your child in the neighborhood school and leave it to the school basedteam.
When we have a new general ed student with an iep at my school, we meet with the parents and adopt the iep as is and schedule a 45 or 60 day review.
But for students not in general ed, it's much more complicated.
In my district, the final decision of an outside placement (even one within the district) is above the discretion of our school based team. We make LRE (least restrictive environment) statements, write appropriate goals, put in appropriate service hours, write detailed reports with standardized scores, skill levels, behaviors, etc. We load up the IEP and put in accomodations and recommendations that should make it very clear that a general ed setting is not the LRE. All in the hopes of giving a student what they need but the decision comes from outside/above our school team. Once a student is at our school, it takes months and many meetings and that is for a placement within the district. For a private placement, the public options have to be exhausted.
TLDR: go straight to "central office" not through your neighborhood school.

I'm a special education teacher and agree with this 100%.