Wednesday, March 17, 2010

IEP Process: STEP 1 -- Referral and Student Support Team (SST)

You can begin the IEP process 2 ways:
1. Parents can give a written request that their child have an IEP, or teachers and administrators can start
the process. If a parent requests the IEP, the process begins much faster.
2. Teachers or administrators can request that a child be referred to the Student Support Team process
(through which it is determined wether or not the child should continue in the IEP process). This can take
a much longer time (in some cases 1-2 years).

Student Support Team: The SST is a team of people including a child's teacher, parents and administrators. They meet to talk about the child's strengths, weaknesses and they design a specific plan containing strategies to help the child to be more successful in school. The SST implements the plan. After the plan is implemented, the SST meets again to talk about how the child is doing. At this point, teachers and administrators can (with parental consent) refer a child to special education (meaning they would have an IEP written for them). This process may be helpful if you are unsure if your child needs special education services. However, this process takes a very long time. If you are sure that your child needs an IEP, you should not wait to have the school initiate the SST process, you should request that your child receive special education services in writing.

I am on an SST for a student, but it is unclear if the child will receive special education. This determination may take 1-2 years. What are others' experiences with the SST process? Is it something you might recommend to parents?

If the school does refer a child to special education, the parent must provide consent to allow the child to be evaluated. This means that the parent must say it is okay that the child be given an assessment that will give parents, teachers and administrators more information about the child. Once this happens, the child moves to the next stage: evaluation and eligibility. Now teachers and administrators have 60 days to give the child the assessment and determine if the child should receive special education services.

1 comment:

  1. I went through the SST process last year for a child - a four year old who was having trouble adapting to the school day (he would continually cry and stay by himself), and who was showing autistic behaviors. During the 6 week process, my school counselor provided me with 5-6 strategies to try in the classroom to make the home-school transition easier for him, but after 6 weeks, he was still not interacting with the other children, and was barely speaking to the adults. In the end, the parents pulled him out of the school, saying they would place him in a less-structured daycare setting (I found out later that they kept him at home, and now he is back at our school in Pre-K again). I was frustrated during this process because it was very clear that there was more going on with the child than just homesickness, but we were unable to convey these observations to the parents - I was told that legally we were not allowed to even suggest getting the child tested for autism. So what is our role, when we suspect a child may be autistic - do we have to go through the SST process, or as a teacher am I able to provide the parents with information about it?

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