Assistive technology (AT): Any item a child needs to increase, maintain or improve how the child does in school. AT includes low-tech and high-tech items, from a calculator to a computer. AT also can mean services a child needs to help in choosing, getting, or using the item.
Behavioral Intervention Plan (BIP): The IEP Team makes a plan to help prevent problem behaviors. The plan helps a child learn new appropriate behaviors. A positive behavior plan is not a list of punishments. The plan uses information from a functional behavioral assessment.
CESA: Cooperative Educational Service Agency. An agency that provides special education and other services to schools. Schools buy services from a CESA, but the school is still responsible for the services.
Consent: The parent tells the school in writing the parent understands and agrees to what the school plans to do. The consent form says the parent understands consent is voluntary, and the parent can take it back at any time before the school does what it plans to do. Parents can revoke the consent, but it does not cancel what the LEA has already done.
Evaluation: When a professional gathers information about a child to decide if the child qualifies for special education or the kind and amount of services the child needs. Evaluation can be testing, observing, or talking to people who work with the child.
Evaluation Report: The IEP team gathers all evaluation information about a child who is being evaluated. They work together to write a final report about the evaluation. The report includes whether the child qualifies for special education.
Free, Appropriate Public Education (FAPE): Special education and related services that are provided at public expense, under public supervision and direction, without charge to the parents, meet state and federal requirements; include preschool, elementary school and secondary school education; and are provided according to an IEP.
Functional Behavioral Assessment (FBA): The process of coming to an understanding of why a student engages in challenging behavior and how student behavior relates to the environment. The purpose of the functional behavioral assessment is to gather information to better understand the specific reasons for the student’s problem behavior. (Functional Behavioral Assessment: Policy Development in light of Emerging Research and Practice, National Association of State Directors of Special Education, March 1998)
General education curriculum: What children without disabilities learn in the regular education classroom.
Home-based schooling: Parents choose to teach their child at home instead of sending their child to school to learn basic subjects.
Homebound schooling: When the child’s IEP Team decides it is appropriate, the school teaches a child at home. The IEP Team’s decision must be based on the child’s needs.
IDEA: Individuals with Disabilities Education Act is the federal statute that mandates a FAPE for students with disabilities.
Identification: The decision to evaluate a child to determine whether special education services are needed.
IEP: Individualized Education Program - is a written plan developed at a meeting that includes appropriate school staff and parents. It determines the special education program for a student with disabilities through individually designed instructional activities constructed to meet goals and objectives established for the student. It establishes the rationale for a student’s placement and documents the provision of FAPE.
IEP Team: Individualized Education Program Team -is the group of individuals who are responsible for the development, review and revision of the student's individualized education program. The team comprises the parent, the student (if appropriate), required school personnel and other knowledgeable individuals at the discretion of the school district or parent.
Itinerant instruction: Instruction that is provided by staff traveling to multiple schools or school districts and offer services in such areas as Visual Impairment, Hearing Impairment, Orientation and Mobility, Physical Therapy, Occupational Therapy, etc.
LEA representative: A person on the IEP Team who has knowledge about, and can commit, the school’s resources so that the child receives the IEP services.
LRE -- Least Restrictive Environment: Is the standard that students with disabilities are educated with children who are not disabled to the maximum extent appropriate. It means that special classes, separate schooling or other removal of students with disabilities from the general educational environment should occur only when the severity of the disability is such that education in general education classes with the use of supplementary aids and services cannot be achieved satisfactorily.
Manifestation Determination: Is the process for reviewing your child’s misconduct (behavior) to determine whether a removal that is a change of placement can be implemented as a disciplinary action. The review is conducted at a meeting of the IEP team and other qualified personnel. The team must consider all relevant information in terms of your child’s misconduct (behavior).
Placement: The child’s setting (regular class, resource room, self-contained class), and the school building the child attends, for receiving special education.
Related Services: Things a child may need to benefit from special education. They are included in the IEP. Examples of related services are occupational therapy and physical therapy.
Special Education: Specially designed instruction to meet the unique needs of a child with a disability. The services are provided at no cost to the parents. The services can be provided in many different settings.
Supplementary Aids and Services: Services and supports provided in regular education classes and other settings to help a child with a disability be educated with children who do not have disabilities as much as is appropriate.
Transition: Transition is the term for preparing a child for life after high school. Transition planning is a required part of every child’s IEP starting at age 14. Transition planning is also required for every child moving from Birth to Three Programs to a school’s Early Childhood special education. Sometimes transition planning happens when a child moves from one grade to the next, or one school to the next. Transition can also mean moving from one class to the next class in school.
Wisconsin Alternate Assessment: State guidelines for testing children with disabilities who cannot take the regular required state tests.