The Supreme Court of the United States ruled Monday that parents who send their children to private schools because of their special needs cannot be barred from receiving taxpayer-funded reimbursements solely for choosing a private school.
The case began in Forest Grove, Oregon, when the administrators of Forest Grove High School allegedly ignored reports indicating that a student identified as T.A. might have Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. T.A. was floundering in school because of his undiagnosed disorder, and after he ran away from home multiple times, his mother took him out of public school and placed him in a private, residential school.
There, he was diagnosed and received treatment, and T.A.'s family sued the school district for denying him treatment under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. The Act entitles children to "free, appropriate public education," and the Supreme Court this week ruled that when public schools cannot or will not provide this for its students with special needs, school districts are obligated to pay for private tuition, even when the district disagrees with the parents' assessment of the student's needs.
Opponents of the ruling, which was passed 6 votes to 3 in the Supreme Court, say that it will drain resources from already-underfunded schools and induce parents to choose private schools specifically because of the ruling. In New York City alone, there were 4,638 cases last year where public schools had to reimburse parents for private school tuition, costing the city's taxpayers nearly $89 million. They argue that IDEA only requires private tuition reimbursement when the public schools recommend that a student would be better off in private schooling. Antonin Scalia, David Souter, and Clarence Thomas were the dissenters in the case.
Proponents of the ruling say that it has only allowed T.A.'s family to argue for the right to reimbursement. David Salmons, the attorney who represented T.A. and his family, states that despite the ruling, "parents have the burden of showing that there was a failure to
provide a free appropriate public education, and they have the burden
to show that their private placement was appropriate."
What do you think? Does the benefit of expanding special education outweigh the cost of providing it? Has the Supreme Court overreached the bounds of IDEA, or has it simply clarified what the act has always meant?
Related: News stories about special education
(Photo credit: dbking)
