Considerations in Placement Decisions for Students With Extensive Support Needs: An Analysis of LRE Statements

Abstract

Special education consists of specially designed services available for students with disabilities, and should be available across placements. Students with the most significant disabilities continue to be taught in restrictive settings, despite accumulating evidence suggesting their special education services can be delivered effectively in general education settings. Every individualized education program (IEP) must contain a statement describing how the student will be provided a free and appropriate education in the least restrictive environment. The present study used content analysis to examine least restrictive environment statements of 88 students' individualized education programs (IEPs) to determine what factors, including supplementary aids and services, were considered in making placement decisions. We further analyzed the classes and activities in which students participated in general education settings. Findings reveal supplementary aids and services were not considered in placement decisions, although a number of factors centering on curricular considerations, environmental demands, student deficit, and personnel requirements were noted in making placement decisions. We further found students primarily participated in non-academic instruction while in general education settings. Implications for policy, practice, and research are included.

Outcomes of Inclusive Versus Separate Placements: A Matched Pairs Comparison Study

“…While the school district’s procedural manual had clear guidelines for IEP team placement decision-making, the actual decisions made seemed to be dependent on who was on a child’s IEP team. Similar to the results found by Brock (2018) and Kurth et al (2019), and based on their experiences, the district personnel surmised that this might be due to various IEP teams’ perceived ability or inability to support the student in the general education setting and, in some cases, parents and teachers who thought their children would be “safer” or “get more intensive services” in a separate setting. Historically, there seemed to have been some district team members who understood the evidence from the research, and valued inclusive schooling for all students, whereas many other district team members did not.…”

“…We had only the IEP documents with notes, descriptions of students, assessments, and other data. IEPs can be quite varied related to how much is written down and documented related to many different decisions (Kurth et al, 2019). In addition, we did not “test” the students to verify the accuracy of the levels of performance as described in the students’ last IEPs.…”

“…As the study by Kurth et al (2019) demonstrated, how an IEP team decides on placement is widely varied. In fact, Table 1 shows how two children with very similar characteristics, entering the school district at approximately the same time, were labeled and placed in completely different situations.…”

“…In a recently published study by Kurth and colleagues (2019), the authors examined 88 IEPs and conducted a content analysis of the placement decisions made by IEP teams. Specifically, least restrictive environment (LRE) statements for students with ESNs were analyzed to determine the primary factors that were considered in determining educational placements.…”

Are Students with Mathematics Learning Disabilities Receiving FAPE?: Insights from a Descriptive Review of Individualized Education Programs

“…Studies conducted after the reauthorization of the 2004 IDEA suggest that the issue of congruence among identified needs, goals, and services delivered remains a concern (see Catone & Brady, 2005; Hoover et al., 2019; Hott et al., 2019). In addition, the types and settings of service offerings may not be individualized (Kurth et al., 2019a, Kurth et al., 2019b). Although 15 districts were included in the study, within‐district patterns were present, and there appeared to be little differentiation among both goals and services included in student IEPs.…”