United States Supreme Court Decision Expands and Unifies Rights of Special Education Students

On March 22, 2017, the United States Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision expanding and unifying the rights of disabled students attending public school in the United States. The decision reached by our Supreme Court in Endrew F. v. Douglas County School District is important because it now provides a uniform standard for the education of disabled students throughout the country. For years, the Federal Circuit Courts had disagreed as to the amount of educational progress a school district should be required to demonstrate to show that a special needs student had received a “…free education in the least restrictive environment” as required by the Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA). While classified special needs students in New Jersey had already enjoyed the protections afforded by the higher standard imposed by our Third Circuit Court of Appeals, the Supreme Court has now reversed and vacated the lower standard that the Tenth Circuit  and other circuits had previously applied; that standard only required that the school district show “some” or “more than de minimus” progress to demonstrate compliance with its obligation to provide a free and appropriate education in the least restrictive environment as required by the IDEA. Accordingly, our Supreme Court has now rejected this easier standard to prove compliance with the IDEA and has, instead, imposed a uniform higher standard to determine if a school district has complied with its obligation to provide a free and appropriate education in the least restrictive environment for its special needs students. Now, here in New Jersey and throughout the United States, the Supreme Court has held the IDEA requires that the educational program provided by a school district for a classified student be “… reasonably calculated to enable (that) child to make progress appropriate in light of th(at) child’s circumstances.” This recent Supreme Court decision is accordingly a real substantive victory for special education students throughout our country; “some” or “de minimus” progress is now longer sufficient. A school district educating a classified special needs student must now show that the program and placement offered by the school district was“…reasonably calculated to enable (that) child to make progress appropriate in light of th(at) child’s circumstances.”