School wants to switch from IEP to 504 - help!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One thing you should watch out for is them cutting most of the services but leaving something minimal so they don't have to provide all the documentation PPs noted above.

After a full year of trying we finally got an IEP with the help of an advocate and at the one month review they slashed the whole thing so that we were only left with a 1/2 hour of push-in services every week. I blame myself for not bringing the advocate to the review.

Please don't blame yourself. I know, to some level, we all do on this board, for many things, but don't. This system is set up to put the kids and parents at a disadvantage and at some point or another we have ALL gotten or will get screwed. This is so typical and it makes me so mad. I truly, truly feel for ELL students whose parents may not speak English. This system is so labyrinthine, with so much bureaucracy and it's all a game that depends on which side can play theirs better. How those poor people manage to ever get their children help is beyond me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP - I would get an advocate now rather than later. They absolutely could have decided to accept the evals and IEP from the previous school. Instead they want to remove the IEP altogether. A more typical approach as was mentioned above would be to chip away at service hours and build a case to remove it at the 3-year triennial.

The silver lining is that they have shown their hand now. Bringing an advocate will let them know you won't be pushed around. You should also learn a lot about the process from your advocate and maybe later you can do more of the advocacy solo.

There are a lot of advocacy threads on DC Urban Moms going on now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP - I would get an advocate now rather than later. They absolutely could have decided to accept the evals and IEP from the previous school. Instead they want to remove the IEP altogether. A more typical approach as was mentioned above would be to chip away at service hours and build a case to remove it at the 3-year triennial.

The silver lining is that they have shown their hand now. Bringing an advocate will let them know you won't be pushed around. You should also learn a lot about the process from your advocate and maybe later you can do more of the advocacy solo.

There are a lot of advocacy threads on DC Urban Moms going on now.

IT's that time of year.