Anonymous wrote:Get an advocate. Schools fear advocates. They actually fear anyone who attends the meetings and has actually read SPED laws and regulations. The laws are actually simple and straightforward. In lieu of advocate read up on MD SPED regulations, call a meeting, cite the regulations by number. That’s how to get them to implement an IEP and write a legit IEP. Good luck.
This is probably true. We’re lawyers and I wonder how much leeway we get because we make them nervous - even though we aren’t special ed lawyers or combative or confrontational. But we’re also very engaged in our kid’s IEP meetings. We show up in person, we come prepared, we ask a lot of questions, we make them explain things and don’t move forward until we understand. OP, if you don’t like the goals on the IEP, you don’t have to sign off on it. You can call and IEP meeting and ask them to change the existing goals. We worked with an advocate at one point where she taught us behind the scenes about how to read our child’s IEP and for changes to make. Going in and sounding informed I think made us seem more authoritative.