IEP expiration date and reduction in services

[Guest guest]

Facts:

Current IEP has

1 hour meetings w/ educational team (including parent) and autism

consultant 2 X per month.

1/2 hour meetings w/ educational team (including parent) 2 X per

month.

So each week I've been involved in meetings

discussing/evaluating/reviewing/revising his ABA program. We wait

for the consultant to come to the meetings every other week when we

have big issues that come up. This system has worked so well and my

son's really done well in KDG this year, the team is all on the same

page using ABA methodology in teaching him.

We just came from the IEP meeting last night. Our current IEP

expires today and after a 4 hour meeting the team didn't complete a

new IEP so another meeting is scheduled for next Tuesday. Question

1: Do I need to get an extension on his current IEP? He has ESY

services and his IEP calls for 5 hours per day of ABA but it's only

listed for the dates last summer and Christmas and Spring Break.

There will be two days he will not have an IEP in place because

Friday and Tuesday there is no school.

Question 2: The school has decided to cut my son's one on one time

with the Special Ed teacher from 1 hour per day to 1/2 hour per day.

AND

They have decided to fire the consultant and bring in someone from

the local " Autism Team " . The only person who's qualified to attend

these meetings from the " Autism Team " can't, so they want to put

that the consultant will attend as needed, because they can't

guarantee that she'll be able to make every meeting even once a

month!?!

Also they want to cut the meeting time with the parent from every

week, to once a month and even then, they can't guarantee the

consultant will be there!!!

I should add that the team agrees that although my son has made

progress compared to himself, he has NOT closed the gap on himself

and his peers, he's still 24 months delayed in communication, verbal

reasoning, daily living skills, socialization skills and pragmatic

language!!! Nothing has changed there, so what's their basis for

making this decision? The Principle told us at the meeting that " We

are spending way to much money. The teachers need overtime to attend

the meetings, we have to pay the consultant, and we spend way more on

your son than we do on any other child. " At which point someone on

the team interupted and stopped that conversation and they went in

another direction of course.

So, Question 2 is: Isn't that a drastic reduction in services when

tests scores show he's still 2 standard deviations below the mean????

Thanks as always everyone!!!~