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Analysis Of FAPE And The Least Restrictive Environment

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Placement decisions related to students with disabilities is an issue that arises from providing a free, appropriate public education (FAPE) and the least restrictive environment (LRE). While FAPE and LRE are not new requirements, the Individuals with Disabilities Educational Act (IDEA) continues to be open to interpretation and implementation of the mandates (McGovern, 2015). A student’s least restrictive environment is the setting where the student can be integrated with his non-disabled peers. IDEA requires that students with disabilities be educated in the most integrated, least restrictive environment (Carson, 2015); however, this is where the grey area enters. The interpretation of what the least restrictive environment is, depends …show more content…

Segregating students based on race, gender, ethnicity is no different than segregating students based on a disability. Two other cases laid the way for developing rights for students with disabilities: Pennsylvania Association for Retarded Children v. Pennsylvania and Mills v. Board of Education. Both cases ruled in favor of the student not being excluded from public education. From here the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975 (EAHCA) was enacted. This was to guarantee access to public education with federal funding being given to states that assured all students with disabilities were given access to a free and appropriate public education (FAPE) (McGovern, 2015). Then from FAPE, the least restrictive environment (LRE) mandate was developed. In 1990, EAHCA was renamed the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). IDEA has been amended several times since the renaming. With the focus on LRE, how is the law interpreted and how to professional educators determine a student’s LRE effectively? According to Carson (2015), there is no critical framework that analyzes the competing interpretations of the LRE requirement. Examining the needs-based approach and the availability-based approach raises many important aspects to determining a student’s LRE. Relying on the availability approach often times causes students to be placed in a more restrictive environment. If a school or district does not have the services or

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