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I currently work in the department of Special Education at a local high school. I was just wondering: does law and special education ever intersect? What would one do?

As a parent of a child in special ed and several family members who are teachers and administrators, it seems to me that law and special ed do intersect. Mostly in areas where disagreements arise between parents and schools disagree about treatments, resources, and levels of participation.

In the DC area, I have heard that Fairfax County (VA) and Montomery County (MD) appear to have higher than usual amounts of litigation on these matters. This may be related to the relatively high level of resources for families in these areas. I would imagine that outside of some hot zones, it may be tough to string together enough work in this area for it to be someone's sole focus, unless they worked for the schools districts.

In my law school's (small) market, there were a few firms that specialized in representing school districts. Special ed would come up in the sense that they represented school districts who were being sued for not offering the right special ed options. I doubt it was anyone's sole area of practice, though. And conversely, parents of special ed kids bringing suit need lawyers, although again, I doubt it would be someone's sole practice area.

I would imagine there are people in the Department of Education (feds or local government) also working on e.g. legislation or policy related to special ed. But I don't know enough to be more specific, sorry.

I hear that high school special ed teachers are prone to getting assaulted by students. Kids' parents might need lawyers to smooth things out when that happens.

Absolutely -- Section 504, the IDEA, negotiating with the BOE re your child's IEP, due process...

haus wrote:it seems to me that law and special ed do intersect. Mostly in areas where disagreements arise between parents and schools disagree about treatments, resources, and levels of participation.

+1

A friend of mine from undergrad opened up his own shop in MN helping parents with exactly this kind of thing.