It has been four decades since there has been a major update to the regulations for Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. Last year, the U.S. Department of Education announced that it looking at the rules and a proposed rule revision was originally scheduled to be published in…
According to an updated policy statement released by the U.S. Departments of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Education (USDE) released on November 28, 2023, 55% of preschoolers with disabilities get special education services in classrooms separate from their peers. It goes on to say that young children with disabilities should…
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, with only 21 states reporting, over 2 million children were disenrolled from Medicaid in those 21 states as of November 14th. Overall, and as predicted by researchers, about 70% of those disenrollments occurred because of procedural reasons (e.g., states having outdated contact information for…
In a Wednesday, November 15, 2023 press conference, U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona expressed strong concerns regarding analyses of the national data collection from the 2020-21 school year through the U.S. Education Department’s (USDE) Office for Civil Rights (OCR) Data Collection. The data from the mandatory survey of preK-12 public…
As interest in disability-inclusive curricula grows, in April 2023 the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE) announced the creation of a Disability Inclusive Curriculum Pilot Program to instruct K-12 students on the political, economic, and social contributions of individuals with disabilities. Under the program, schools can apply for up to $30,000…
Filling special education staffing positions continues to be very difficult task, including teaching and nonteaching (classroom aide) jobs. Although numbers nationwide show a smaller percentage of U.S. public schools reported feeling understaffed compared to the start of last school year, 45% versus 53%. In a ddition to the needs in…
Under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), parents and advocates can use a number of dispute resolution options when they believe that a school is failing to serve students as required under federal law. One of those options is the written state complaint (WSC). According to the Council of…
Although IDEA requires schools to inform parents of their right to invite others at special ed. meetings on their behalf, if enacted H.R. 4259 would help to make sure they know of this right, since schools would be required to notify parents of students with disabilities that they can invite…
As has been a much-anticipated development across the nation, the U.S. Department of Education (USDE) continues to delay its release of revised Section 504 regulations. It is hoped that such revisions will clarify how student accommodations under Section 504 align or depart from the rights of students with disabilities under…
50 years after its being enacted, significant updates are being made to Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act to advance equity and bolster protections for people with disabilities. In fact, on September 7, 2023 the Biden-Harris Administration took further action on its commitment to promote access to health care and…
