Least Restrictive Environment (LRE) Determinations

Julie Weatherly featured an article in a journal titled In Case, Volume 48, Numbers 4-6; and in Volume 49, Numbers 1-2. The title of the article is Avoiding Legal Disputes in Special Education: 21 Training Points for Administrators. According to Weatherly, IEP teams need to be careful when making decisions about moving students to more restrictive educational environments. "Courts and federal agencies have indicated that placement teams should clearly and specifically document the options considered on the continuum of alternative placements and why less restrictive options were rejected. The process of determining and documenting what is the LRE is extremely important, as there have been courts that have ruled that a flaw in the process of making the determination is sufficient, in and of itself, to find in favor of the parents' desired placement, regardless of the substance/content of the program or the needs of the student." The regular education classroom is always the first consideration for LRE. It is erroneous to place students in self-contained classrooms first then move backwards along the continuum to the regular education environment. Furthermore, Weatherly adds "...if the placement team moves too quickly along the continuum in making its consideration and skips over less restrictive options along the way without thorough consideration, a court could very likely rule that the team did not procedureally conduct its LRE determination correctly." Documentation supporting all educational decisions for students with disabilities is imperative.