Compton USD Failed to Assess Student's Serious Behaviors for Three Years, Repeatedly Sent Her Home Instead

What Happened

Student is a 12-year-old girl with a history of trauma, prenatal drug exposure, and serious emotional and behavioral difficulties. She had been eligible for special education since 2000 and was identified as having a specific learning disability when she moved into the Compton Unified School District in 2001. By 2002, the district recognized her behaviors were serious enough to qualify her as a student with emotional disturbance, and she was placed in a restrictive day treatment program called Systems of Care for the 2002–2003 and 2003–2004 school years. When Student transitioned out of Systems of Care in 2004, the district placed her in a special day class at Bunche Elementary School — but provided almost no behavioral supports to help her succeed in the new, less restrictive setting.

During the 2004–2005 school year, Student's behaviors escalated significantly. She was repeatedly sent home early as a punishment for classroom behaviors like talking and being out of her seat. She was involved in a fight, vandalized school property, and was twice found on school grounds engaging in inappropriate sexual behavior, with police called for one incident. Despite all of this, the district never held an IEP meeting, never conducted any assessments, and never developed a proper behavior intervention plan based on an actual behavioral assessment. Parent eventually arranged for an independent psychoeducational evaluation and filed for due process after the district failed to respond to multiple requests for records and assessments.

What the District Did Wrong

1. Failure to conduct a Functional Analysis Assessment (FAA) or develop a Behavior Intervention Plan (BIP). California law requires that any student who demonstrates a serious behavior problem must receive a functional analysis assessment, which is then used to create a behavior intervention plan. The district never conducted an FAA during the 2002–2003, 2003–2004, or 2004–2005 school years, even though Student's behaviors were serious enough to require placement in a day treatment program. The teacher eventually attempted to write behavior plans on her own — without any assessment, without IEP team involvement, and without informing Parent — but those plans were not produced until the second day of the due process hearing and were excluded from evidence.

2. Repeatedly sending Student home as a discipline strategy. The district's primary response to Student's misbehavior was to send her home early. This happened throughout multiple school years. The ALJ found that sending a student home early repeatedly — without addressing the underlying behavior through assessment and intervention — means the student cannot benefit from her education. An IEP that fails to address behaviors causing a student to miss instructional time is not reasonably calculated to provide educational benefit.

3. Failure to conduct required assessments and hold an IEP meeting. The district's own IEP from June and July 2004 stated that Student needed a new psychoeducational evaluation in September 2004. The district never did it. The triennial assessment and IEP meeting were also due by June 12, 2005 — the district missed that deadline too. When Parent asked about the assessment and IEP meeting, the district gave no written response and provided no notice of its refusal, as required by law.

4. Failure to provide school records. Parent requested Student's educational records multiple times — in September 2005, and again in writing on September 8 and September 16, 2005. The district did not provide any records until November 3, 2005. The district conceded this violation in its closing argument, though the ALJ found it did not rise to the level of a FAPE denial on its own.

5. Inadequate psychoeducational assessment. The only assessment the district ever conducted (in 2002) was found to be sparse and deficient — it appeared to rely on a single test, contained no developmental history, no parent interview, and did not address Student's academic functioning.

What Was Ordered

1. The district must reimburse Parent for the cost of the independent psychoeducational assessment conducted by Dr. Martinez in September 2005, upon submission of an invoice and cancelled check (amount capped at $2,500).
2. The district must fund an independent Functional Analysis Assessment (FAA) conducted by a qualified assessor through a certified non-public agency, meeting all legal requirements under California Code of Regulations, title 5, section 3052.
3. The district must pay for the FAA assessor to attend an IEP meeting at Student's current school in Long Beach following completion of the assessment.
4. The district must meet and confer with Parent within 30 days to develop a plan for 300 hours of one-to-one academic tutoring through a non-public agency, including transportation. Tutoring must begin within 60 days and be completed by December 31, 2007.

Why This Matters for Parents

1. Sending your child home early is not a legal discipline strategy — it's a deprivation of education. This case makes clear that repeatedly removing a student from school for behavioral reasons, without addressing the underlying behavior through assessment and an IEP, denies the student a free appropriate public education. If your child is regularly being sent home or excluded from class, document every instance and demand an IEP meeting to address the behavior.

2. If your child has serious behavioral needs, the district is legally required to conduct a Functional Analysis Assessment. California law is explicit: students with serious behavior problems must receive an FAA, and that assessment must be used to develop a formal Behavior Intervention Plan that becomes part of the IEP. A teacher's informal behavior chart is not a substitute. If your child's behavior is impeding their learning and no FAA has been done, you can request one in writing.

3. If the district fails to assess your child when required, you may be entitled to reimbursement for a private evaluation. In this case, the district's own IEP committed to conducting a psychoeducational assessment — and then never did it. Because the district failed to meet its assessment obligation, Parent was reimbursed for hiring an independent evaluator. You do not need to wait indefinitely for a district assessment that was already promised.

4. Moving to a new district does not erase the old district's obligations. The district argued it shouldn't have to fund an independent FAA because Student had moved to Long Beach. The ALJ rejected this argument. If a district denied your child appropriate services while they were enrolled there, that district can still be held responsible for compensatory remedies even after your child transfers.

5. Document everything, especially when the district refuses to act. In this case, the district never provided written notice of its refusal to conduct assessments or hold IEP meetings — a violation of federal law. When a district refuses your request for an evaluation, a meeting, or records, it is legally required to give you that refusal in writing with an explanation. If it doesn't, that silence itself can be evidence of a procedural violation.