When Zero Tolerance policies run head-on into IDEA it’s not surprising to learn that special needs children are being arrested (handcuffed and removed from school) at an ever-increasing rate. Some parents are reporting that children as young as 5 (kindergarteners) are being handcuffed and removed from schools by police. Many with known (documented) disabilities such as autism, Tourettes and ADHD.

It’s a scary possibility, and one that seems to be on the rise. A child with a disability gets frustrated, melts down, gets out of control. School personnel are unable (or unwilling) to address this behavior in positive ways or to de-escalate the situation. Law enforcement officers are called in. Child is hauled off as a criminal.

The general public has a variety of opinions on this, ranging from “how horrifying” to “it’s the parents’ fault”. But the truth is there are hundreds (thousands) of disabled children who are overwhelmed at school daily and hundreds (thousands) of IEPs that don’t adequately address these children’s behaviors, and hundreds (thousands) of school personnel without the training and resources to handle the children’s special needs and hundreds (thousands) of parents who live with the nagging fear of that dreaded phone call from the school.

This week’s issue of the Wrightslaw newsletter has several articles devoted to arresting children for school misbehavior and the prevalence of disabled children who are incarcerated in the juvenile justice system. The statistics are sobering for sure.

Pete Wright offers interesting insight to this school/arrest approach, and what parents can do to get the juvenile justice system to help them in these situations. I think he’s got some great points. The first of which is that the child’s IEP needs to be re-addressed and is likely junk:

In most cases, the child's IEP is junk - it is inadequate and needs to be completely revised to address this child's needs. If the IEP is not based on current data and does not include present levels of academic achievement and functional performance, the child needs to be reevaluated.

You want current information on the child's academic skills, especially reading. If the child's academic skills are significantly behind the child's peer group, you would expect the child to be frustrated at school - and to develop behavior problems.

What has the school done to address these issues? (In most cases, the answer is "nothing")

Secondly, Pete points out that schools are required by law to consider special factors (including behavior) that impede a child’s learning. And in the case of behavior, a functional behavioral assessment is in order:

Did the school complete a functional behavioral assessment on the child? Did the IEP team develop a behavior intervention plan? Did the IEP team develop positive behavioral interventions and strategies to address the behavior? Did school personnel actually implement these positive behavioral interventions and strategies?

Did the school revise the child's IEP and behavior plan to address the behavior that led the school staff to have the child arrested? Did the school train the child's teachers to use positive behavior interventions, as required by law?

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