NH 2006 Legislative Session
Special Education
last updated 12/30/05 at 5:00AM
Special Education laws affect homeschoolers in several ways:
- Identification -
Current law requires districts to offer testing to any
child referred to them through the Child Find Program. Some
homeschoolers want to ensure that they continue to have this
right. Others want nothing to do with any government programs,
especially ones that single their child out. In NH, parents
have the right to home educate their special needs children with
no more regulation than other children,
and to refuse services. This is not true in all states. Once
the child is identified, with the advent of national databases,
that designation could follow him/her to any state where his/her
parents relocate. The home education laws in that state might
not permit the parent to do what s/he thinks is best for the
child.
- Refusal of services -
Under current
federal and state law, in NH a parent's letter of intent to
homeschool can be taken by the district, if it so chooses, as
refusal of services. It is up to each district whether or not it
will offer special education services to homeschooled children.
This has a strange twist -- it is only during the years when
compulsory attendance requires the parent to submit a letter of
intent that the district can refuse services. Until the age of 6,
districts must provide services to "homeschooled" children. (I have
never investigated this issue as it applies to a child who turns
16.)
- Delivery of services -
Many, many districts do provide special education services
to homeschoolers. Some wish to work with the parent to provide
the optimal learning environment for the child. Some see it as
preventing problems down the road should the child re-enter
the public school system. Some do so reluctantly, as part of a
negotiated agreement when an unhappy parent withdraws the child
from public school and his/her IEP, and threatens to sue the school
for not following through on its legal obligations.