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The landmark civil rights decision ended de jure segregation, and paved the way for advocates to later demand that the provision of equality in education be extended to children with disabilities (41).
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The Elementary and Secondary Education Act funded special programs for the education of disabled and disadvantaged children including more than $200B for Title I, allocating more money to schools with high populations of low-income students (10, 18).
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These amendments created more new programs for the education of handicapped children (10).
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These amendments improved bilingual education for non-English speakers and provided more funding for special education (10).
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The New Hampshire Department of Education established “a program for the education, training, and vocational rehabilitation for the blind of all ages, whether or not they are eligible for aid to the needy blind under the department of health and human services (22)."
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The Education of the Handicapped Act of 1970 established a grand program designed to encourage states to establish special education programs (39).
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The Pennsylvania Association for Retarded Children (PARC) sued the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania on behalf of students who had been denied access to public education. The parties settled in district court, and the consent agreement stated that “all mentally retarded persons are capable of benefiting from a program of education and training” and that Pennsylvania was obligated to provide them with a free public education “appropriate to their capacity" (3).
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This case was brought before a district court on behalf of several students with various disabilities who had been expelled or otherwise denied services by schools in the District of Columbia. The court ruled that the exclusion of students with disabilities from public education was unconstitutional and that insufficient funding was not a valid excuse for exclusion (41).
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Section 504 is considered a civil rights law. It applies to all people with disabilities that impair a major life activity and protects students with disabilities by requiring that they receive accommodations and services designed to meet their needs as adequately as the needs of students without disabilities are met (37).
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These amendments extended the the Education of the Handicapped Act through 1977 and allowed for increased federal funding for special education (5).
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This law ensured access to public education for students with physical or mental disabilities and required public schools to have systems for parents of students with disabilities to lodge complaints (26).
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New Hampshire approved a status guaranteeing a free appropriate public education in the least restrictive environment to students with disabilities in line with EACHA (21).
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This case was brought before the Supreme court on behalf of Amy Rowley, a deaf first grader in Peekskill, NY who was denied an ASL interpreter by her school district. The court ruled that Amy had not been denied a FAPE because the Education of the Handicapped Act of 1974 only required special education and related services to allow students to "educationally benefit" from instruction, not necessarily to reach their full potential (30).
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This case was brought before the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of Mary Roncker who disagreed with an earlier court’s decision that her son’s Ohio school district was within its rights to place him in county school where he would not have contact with his non-disabled peers. The court ruled in favor of Mrs. Roncker, declared that the district court used an improper standard of review, and remanded the case back to that court (20).
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This case was brought before the Supreme Court on behalf of an Irving, Texas School district that disagreed with a lower court’s finding that catheterization was a related service needing to be provided by the school, rather than a medical procedure. The Supreme Court upheld the lower court’s decision because the procedure did not need to be conducted by a doctor and was necessary for the student to “benefit” from her education (34).
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This case was brought before the Supreme Court on behalf of the Burlington, MA school district which disputed a lower court’s finding that the district must reimburse Michael Panico’s family for private school tuition. The court found in favor of the MA Department of Education and ruled that the school district must reimburse the family because the private school was agreed to be Michael’s appropriate placement (19).
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This reauthorization extended legal protection to infants and toddlers with disabilities and allowed parents who won EAHCA legal cases to collect attorney’s fees (36).
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Brought before the Supreme Court on behalf of Bill Honig, the California state superintendent, who disputed a district court ruling that EACHA’s “stay put” provision didn’t support an exception for a school’s unilateral removal of a dangerous student. The supreme court ruled that a district must seek an injunction to remove a “dangerous” student for more than 10 days for behavior related to a disability and that states must provide services to students when districts deny them (29).
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This case was brought before the Third Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of Christopher Polk, a severely disabled 14 year old in Pennsylvania who was denied therapy from a licensed physical therapist at his school. The court ruled that Christopher had been denied a FAPE because the Education of the Handicapped Act of 1974 required special education and related services to allow "meaningful educational benefit (35)."
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This case was brought before the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of Timothy W. whose Rochester, NH school district denied him special education services because his disabilities were so severe that he was thought to be incapable of benefitting. The court interpreted EACHA as having a “zero-reject” policy and ruled in Timothy’s favor because EACHA required that a FAPE be provided for all students with qualifying disabilities (28).
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New Hampshire established the Advisory Committee on the Education of Children/Students with Disabilities to advise the education commissioner, promote cooperation in the special education community, and review state special education funding and program impact (15).
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This case was brought before the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of Daniel R. R. and his parents who believed that Daniel’s school’s choice not to mainstream Daniel was a violation of the EHA. The court ruled in favor of the school district because Daniel was not seen to be receiving academic or non-academic benefits from regular school classroom placement and his presence was deemed unfair to the rest of the class (8).
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This civil rights law prohibits discrimination against people with disabilities by public agencies (36).
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In this Reauthorization of the EAHCA, the term handicap was replaced with the term disability, autism and traumatic brain injury were added to the list of recognized disabilities, and transition services were described for children over 16 years old (41).
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This case was brought before the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of a New Jersey school board who disagreed with a lower court’s ruling that a segregated special education classroom was not the LRE for Rafael Oberti’s education. The court found in favor of Rafael’s family and upheld the lower court’s ruling because the services provided to Rafael in the special education classroom could also have been provided in the regular classroom (6).
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This case was brought before the Supreme Court on behalf of Shannon Carter’s school district which disputed an earlier court’s finding that the district had not provided Shannon with a FAPE under IDEA and that it must reimburse Shannon’s family for private school tuition fees. The Supreme Court found in favor of Shannon’s family and affirmed the judgement of the Court of Appeals (38).
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This case was brought before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of the Sacramento School district, defending its decision to remove Rachel from the regular education environment on the belief that she was too severely disabled to benefit. The court considered academic and non-academic benefits and consequences, Rachel’s effect on her teacher and classmates, and cost and found in favor of Rachel’s family because the district did not prove that special education was the L.R.E (9).
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The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act Amendments of 1997 shifted focus from providing to improving educational opportunity and achievement for students with disabilities. The amendments included stricter identification requirements, IEPs focused on improving results, least restrictive environment consideration, higher accountability, and more parent involvement (7).
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This case was brought before the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of Edward’s Springer whose parents believed his school district owed them reimbursement for private school tuition. The court affirmed an earlier court’s decision to deny reimbursement because Edward was not found to have a qualifying disability and was not protected by IDEA (27).
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New Hampshire defined an adequate for all students. In part, the definition requires an appropriate education to provide all students with the opportunity to obtain skills in literacy enabling critical thinking and effective communication, skills in math and science enabling analysis and decision-making, knowledge of civics and government enabling citizenship, grounding in the arts to enable appreciation of cultural heritage, and skills for lifelong learning (24).
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NH Enacted a status addressing bullying and cyberbullying in public schools (25).
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NCLB required states to be held accountable for the yearly progress of students, including students with disabilities, with the aim of raising proficiency and closing achievement gaps. Yearly assessment is the measure of progress to which all students are subjected (41).
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New Hampshire specified that foster parents were eligible to be surrogate parents under the law to students with disabilities (23).
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This case was brought before the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of a school district that disagreed with a lower court’s finding that the school failed to provide Robert Clark with a FAPE. The court found in favor of Robert’s family and upheld the lower court’s decision because the school failed to implement an appropriate behavior management plan in accordance with his IEP (13).
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Among other changes, most recent amendments to IDEA in 2004 specify that physical education must be made available to children with disabilities as part of a FAPE and require that services be provided allowing students with disabilities to learn with their non-disabled peers to the maximum extent possible (40).
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This case was brought before the Supreme Court on behalf of the parents of Brian Schaffer, who believed that their son’s IEP was inadequate. The court ruled in favor of Jerry Weast, the school’s superintendent. They agreed with a lower court’s finding that Brian’s parent’s had not proven the inadequacy of his IEP and that the burden of proof was rightly placed on them, as the party who brought the suit (33).
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New Hampshire created an autism registry to which all new autism diagnoses must be reported. If an IEP team identifies a student with autism for the purpose of special education eligibility, the ASD diagnosis must be reported if the evaluation is conducted by a licensed or certified health care provider but not if it is conducted by an examiner certified through the NHDOE, Bureau of Credentialing who is not a licensed or a certified health care provider (16).
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Two cross appeals were brought before the First Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of a Maine school district and a young girl’s family. The school district disputed a lower court’s finding that the girl (L.I.) had a qualifying disability under IDEA even though her academic work was acceptable. L.I.’s family disputed the same court’s finding that the district was not responsible for private school tuition reimbursement. The appeal’s court affirmed the lower court’s ruling (31).
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The NH State Board of Education adopted specific policies in-line with IDEA 2004 and Section 504 to provide a FAPE to all students with disabilities enrolled in programs receiving public funds (14).
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This case was brought before the Supreme Court on behalf of Savana Redding, a 13 year-old who was suspected of possessing drugs and strip searched at school. The court found that the school violated Savana’s fourth amendment right to protection from unreasonable search and seizure, but they absolved school officials of personal liability (32).
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The Supreme Court found that an Oregon school district had to reimburse private school tuition for T.A. even though he wasn’t evaluated for special education until he was moved to the private school because the, “IDEA authorizes reimbursement for private special-education services when a public school fails to provide a FAPE and the private-school placement is appropriate, regardless of whether the child previously received special-education services through the public school (11).”
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This case was brought before the MA District Court C.A., a student with Asperger’s who was denied transition services in high school. The court ruled that C.A had been denied a FAPE because his IEP did not include appropriate and measurable goals (4).
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New Hampshire updated its policies to reflect changes to national legislation that required the replacement of the term “mental retardation” with “intellectual disability” in federal health, education, and labor policies (1).
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One of the major changes was the addition of NH Ed 1128.08, authorizing reimbursement to a school district who changes a student with a disability’s placement from out-of-district to in-district (17). New Hampshire also updated its policies to reflect the terminology changes outlined in Rosa’s law (14).
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An amendment to RSA 194 clarified “the procedure for the provision of special education and related services” to children in chartered public schools and it’s funding by students’ resident school districts. The amendment also required public chartered schools to provide due process to students in special education and their families (2).
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This case was brought before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of Doug C., a parent who was not included in his son’s IEP meeting due to scheduling issues. The court ruled that Doug’s son had been denied a FAPE due to the district’s failure to include Doug in the development of his son’s IEP, a violation of the procedural requirements of IDEA 2004 (12).
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NH made minor updates to reflect changes to the rules for behavioral interventions, emergency intervention procedures, parental consent, and public and private insurance requirements (14).
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