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Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS)
moved & FCS wants to change current IEP to 504 Why? Help? Advice
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Anonymous
| We have moved from another state with an IEP written for the 2011/2012. We are now in Fairfax county and they are looking at changing IEP to 504. What is going on they have not tested my child yet and school has just started. I am nervous I am going to get screwed for a lack of better words. I know I should get an advocate but have heard the many hours needed you can easily spend $5,000. What to do? Suggestions on advocates and total time and money spent. Is this normal practices for this county to let you know they will be holding a meeting to change the other states IEP to a 504???? Any advice |
Anonymous
| i don't know, but we moved from another county in Virginia to FCPS and they converted our IEP to a Fairfax IEP. They did not redo any of the testing. |
Anonymous
|
I think you need to slow down and seek to understand why they want to make the change. Once you understand why, then you will know if you need to find outside help or if it is something you can resolve on your own.
It's hard for us to comment since we don't know all of the facts. |
Anonymous
| I agree that you need to find out *why* they want to change to a 504. When was your DC last tested? I work in FCPS, and I know that sometimes, if the testing is recent, and does not show the necessary numbers for an IEP, LEGALLY they cannot grant your child an IEP. Perhaps they still want to have some structure and help in place for your DC, but cannot necessarily provide an IEP, and so are looking to at least give a 504. But really, this is just conjecture on my part, and you need to find this out; this you can easily do without an advocate. |
Anonymous
|
We moved from another state to FCPS, got a transition IEP that last for 1 months, which I actually refused to sign, and then had the formal IEP meeting, refused to sign at that meeting because they wanted to dramatically cut all services, and then eventually came to a much better agreement. I am happy with my IEP now---that sped teacher we first encountered was awful so I am blaming the transition experience being so horrible because of that bad apple, if you will.
Because I had not signed the transition IEP I had a lot more leverage in constructing the long term IEP since the county was under the gun to get me to sign. I found it quite helpful to call the FCPS office of mediation to talk me through Virginia's process. Remember, your child has been found eligible for an IEP, you do not need to sign. If you can give us some more particulars about your DC's needs, we may be able to help more. |
Anonymous
| FCPS might be trying to cut services. 504 gets accommodations not any service from a specialist. The IEP should follow you from another state just like the IRS. |
Anonymous
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I agree that you should not sign anything you don't agree with. You do not have to accept a 504 if you currently have an IEP. Qualification for an IEP is based on far more than test scores and it's a common myth that a child can't have an IEP if he is performing at grade level. The key is ability to 'access the curricula' for an 'appropriate education'.
We're in FCPS and I highly recommend Dr. Ruth Heitin as a consultant/advocate. http://www.educationalconsultingva.com/ . She charges $250/hr. It's not cheap but we feel we've gotten very good value for the price. I don't know how complicated your case is but we've spent no where near $5,000 and we have had two kids with IEPs for more than 2 years. We first used Dr. Heitin when my oldest was in kindergarten. We knew early on something was wrong because he was not learning. I wasn't expecting him to be in the 90 percentile but when he continued to be in the bottom 5 percentile (below kids who didn't speak English, whose parents had no education even in their native language), we knew something was wrong. We have multiple reports from private organizations documenting various developmental delays but because he looked 'normal', was social and had no behavior problems, they declined to accept our reports or to evaluate him themselves. I was near panic. Dr. Heitin assisted us with getting an evaluation with a developmental pediatrician who eventually diagnosed DS with ADHD (primarly inattentive). Because of Dr. Heitin, we have excellent IEPs that are implemented approrpiately and DS has made excellent progress. Good luck. |
Anonymous
|
I agree that you should not sign anything you don't agree with. You do not have to accept a 504 if you currently have an IEP. Qualification for an IEP is based on far more than test scores and it's a common myth that a child can't have an IEP if he is performing at grade level. The key is ability to 'access the curricula' for an 'appropriate education'.
We're in FCPS and I highly recommend Dr. Ruth Heitin as a consultant/advocate. http://www.educationalconsultingva.com/ . She charges $250/hr. It's not cheap but we feel we've gotten very good value for the price. I don't know how complicated your case is but we've spent no where near $5,000 and we have had two kids with IEPs for more than 2 years. We first used Dr. Heitin when my oldest was in kindergarten. We knew early on something was wrong because he was not learning. I wasn't expecting him to be in the 90 percentile but when he continued to be in the bottom 5 percentile (below kids who didn't speak English, whose parents had no education even in their native language), we knew something was wrong. We have multiple reports from private organizations documenting various developmental delays but because he looked 'normal', was social and had no behavior problems, they declined to accept our reports or to evaluate him themselves. I was near panic. Dr. Heitin assisted us with getting an evaluation with a developmental pediatrician who eventually diagnosed DS with ADHD (primarly inattentive). Because of Dr. Heitin, we have excellent IEPs that are implemented approrpiately and DS has made excellent progress. Good luck. |
Anonymous
| PP here - sorry for the double posting. Something funky was happening with our server. |
Anonymous
| Thank you for all the help. I will not be signing anything. And to tell you the truth I do not know what is going on. I was told FCPS doesn't like to have IEP for kindergartners but they would be giving her a 504 and that instead of pull out therapy that is in her curent out of state IEP that instead FCPS likes to do push in. And they let me know that they will be setting my date soon for the meeting. I went home thinking okay different county different rules. But went I got home and started looking things up on the computer I thought WHAT???????? They do not know her, or have seen her test yet but want to cut back services based on she is a kindergartner. And I feel lost in a huge system I know nothing about. |
Anonymous
She's a kindergartener? I can understand a lot of the problem. It is going to be hard to do testing on her since she can't read which is going to make it hard to get an IEP. How did you get your IEP? We have a child who did get an IEP during kindergarten, but it is very, very hard to test them since reading is an issue. The main deciding factor for our child was she was so far behind her classmates in learning to read/write/count/etc. She did not have her IEP in place until the end of kindergarten. Personally before hiring a consultant, I'd try and work with the school. |
Anonymous
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I personally would not agree to an IEP without talking to FCPS's Office of Mediation. It is very easy to call them and they can tell you about the process, When was your child originally found eligible for an IEP? All children have to go through a reevaluation 3 years after their initial eligibility. FCPS IEP's are all goal driven. My sense of it is you have to have a goal that designates a 25% delay for that particular goal in order to get an IEP. For instance, they will not put letter formation as a goal until the child is 6 and shows that 25% delay. That being said, I think it is extremely difficult to get a academic goal for kindergarten. Can you think of an area of functioning- speech, social, OT, etc that has a 25% delay so that you can create a goal to put on the IEP to address that delay? If you can, you certainly should be able to keep the IEP an IEP. We probably can give you more insight if you let us know more about the delays of your child. Good luck. Does your daughter have a need |
Anonymous
| You might want to post in the special needs forum |
Anonymous
12:59 here. What service? For example speech therapy has 2 components : articulation and language. I can see some push in for language to monitor progress and application in a classroom setting. Articulation has physical exercises - need 1 to 1 and small group. in any event the speech therapist [or any other service] isn't going to be scheduled for your child in a 504. Did the child have an IEP in pre-K or only commencing in K? Diagnosis ? I assume not LD based on the age. No school district does an IEP for a K effective with the beginning of the school year lightly so FCPS is up to nonsense. yahoo groups for help navigating FCPS: all special ed http://groups.yahoo.com/group/specialedfairfax/ autism spectrum http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/AS-NV/ |
Anonymous
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OP My child has been in therapy since 15mths when she turned 3yrs she was put into the school system and got her first IEP. I see no reason for the change.
And I will celebrate the day we no longer need an IEP. I can't wait for that time but That time is not here yet. And don't forget early intervention is the key |