On July 14, 2025 (form dated July 8, 2025), the Department of Public Instruction (department) received a complaint under state and federal special education law from #### (complainant) against the #### (district). This is the department’s decision regarding that complaint. The issues are whether the district, during the 2024-25 school year: properly implemented the individualized education program (IEP) of a student with a disability regarding specially designed instruction, speech and language therapy, and behavioral supports; and properly responded to a request from the student’s parent for a meeting of the student’s IEP team.
Whether the district properly implemented the IEP of a student with a disability regarding specially designed instruction, speech and language therapy, and behavioral supports.
School districts must provide a free appropriate public education (FAPE) to each student with a disability by developing an IEP that meets the student's unique needs and by implementing special education and related services in accordance with the student's IEP. 34 CFR §§ 300.323(c)(2) & 300.324. Each student’s IEP must address the student's needs that result from the student's disability in order to enable the student to be involved and make appropriate progress in the general education curriculum and toward their IEP goals and meet the student's other educational needs that result from the student's disability. The IEP must include a statement of the special education services to be provided to the student. 34 CFR §§300.320(a), 300.324(a). Districts must ensure that the student's IEP is accessible to each regular education teacher, special education teacher, related services provider, and any other service provider who is responsible for its implementation and that they are informed of their specific responsibilities. 34 CFR § 300.323(d).
The student who is the subject of this complaint attended 4K in the district during the 2024-25 school year. Their initial IEP was developed on November 11, 2024, with subsequent IEP team meetings on December 5, 2024, January 16, 2025, February 3, 2025, and May 19, 2025. The student is enrolled in a different Wisconsin school district for the 2025-26 school year.
The student’s initial IEP developed in November 2024 indicated that they should receive specially designed instruction (SDI) in speech and language for 60 minutes per week in a special education environment. When the student’s IEP team met in December 2024, it added SDI in the following areas: self-regulation for 30 minutes per week in a special education environment, self-regulation for 30 minutes per week in the regular education environment, and early literacy for 20 minutes per day in a special education environment. In February 2025, the IEP team expanded the student’s early literacy SDI to 60 minutes per day in the special education environment. No additional changes were made to the student’s SDI through the end of the 2024-25 school year.
The complainant, who is the student’s parent, stated that the student’s regular education teacher informed them mid-year that the student was not receiving their SDI. Staff failed to track or otherwise document the provision of the majority of the student’s SDI provided during the school year. The district submitted some documentation from the speech language therapist regarding the services they provided the student, it does not indicate that the student was consistently provided 60 minutes of speech and language therapy during the school year. Additionally, district staff were not able to provide evidence that staff provided the student SDI regarding self-regulation and early literacy from the December 2024 IEP through the end of the school year. Similarly, the district was unable to provide evidence that the student’s behavioral supports, including their behavior intervention plan, were properly implemented. The district did not properly implement the student’s IEP regarding specially designed instruction, speech and language therapy, and behavioral supports.
Whether the district properly responded to a request from the student’s parent for a meeting of the student’s IEP team.
The parent of a student with a disability may request an IEP team meeting at any time, and the district should grant any reasonable request for an IEP team meeting. If the district denies the parent's request for an IEP team meeting, the district must provide the parent with a notice of refusal in writing and include an explanation of why the district refuses to grant the request. 34 CFR § 300.503.
Based on emails submitted during the investigation, the parent’s advocate requested an IEP team meeting on March 13, 2025, to address the parent’s concerns regarding implementation of the student’s IEP. The district administrator replied the next day refusing the request for an IEP team meeting and stating that, “[t]here has been multiple review/revise IEP meetings this year. Current data does not warrant a need for an additional IEP meeting.” While the student’s IEP team met multiple times during the school year, there is no evidence that the IEP team specifically discussed whether the student’s IEP was being properly implemented at any of them. Since the district staff did not consistently document information about the implementation of the student’s IEP, it would not have been possible for district staff to review data to conclude an IEP team meeting was not needed. For these reasons, the parent’s request was reasonable and should not have been refused by the district. The district did not properly respond to a request from the student’s parent for a meeting of the student’s IEP team.
Within 30 days of the date of this decision, the district must reconvene the student’s IEP team to determine the amount of compensatory services required for not providing the student SDI as prescribed in their IEP throughout the 2024-25 school year. The district must submit a copy of the revised IEP to the department within 10 days of the IEP team meeting. Even though the student no longer attends school in the district, Office of Special Education (OSEP) clarified in its October 23, 2019, Letter to Anonymous that any outstanding corrective action ordered through a state complaint or due process hearing to remedy the denial of appropriate services must be completed, notwithstanding the child’s relocation, if the ordered relief can reasonably be implemented in the student’s new location and the parent does not reject the remaining services under the ordered relief. For this reason, the district is responsible for determining and ensuring the student-level corrective action outlined in this decision is provided to the student in their current district.
Additionally, within 30 days of the date of this decision, the district must develop and submit to the department for approval a corrective action plan (CAP). This plan must include procedures and training for district staff on the following:
● A process for informing staff of their responsibilities in a student’s IEP;
● A process for tracking the providing of SDI to each student as documented in their IEP, including observations to ensure SDI is being provided; and
● The district must submit documentation supporting the CAP, including training materials.
In addition to the corrective action outlined above, the district is required to review the IEPs of all the students assigned to the same special education teacher and speech-language pathologist that were assigned to the student during the 2024-25 school year to determine whether compensatory services are required for these students.
All noncompliance identified above must be corrected as soon as possible but in no case, more than one year from the date of this decision. This concludes our review of this complaint. This decision is final for the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) State Complaint process. These issues may be addressed through other dispute resolutions, including mediation and due process hearings. For more information, visit the department’s website at http://dpi.wi.gov/sped/dispute-resolution or contact the special education team at (608) 266‑1781.
For questions about this information, contact dpispeddata@dpi.wi.gov (608) 266-1781