Twin Rivers Denied FAPE by Ignoring Student's Behavior Needs for Two Years

What Happened

Student is an 11-year-old boy who has been receiving special education services from Twin Rivers Unified School District since first grade. He was originally found eligible under other health impairment and speech-language impairment, and later re-classified as having a specific learning disability with an auditory processing disorder. Student has a long history of challenging behaviors, including work refusal, emotional outbursts, elopement, and extreme reluctance to speak with anyone outside his family. Since early 2011, Parent had rejected Twin Rivers' offers of school-based placement and insisted that Student remain on a home instruction program. Twin Rivers agreed to that arrangement, providing Student with approximately three hours per week of home instruction — delivered primarily by a general education teacher who had no behavior management training.

Parent filed a due process complaint in March 2014, alleging that Twin Rivers failed to provide behavior support services, failed to address Student's alleged sensory needs, and failed to provide home instruction for 13 weeks in the fall of 2013 when Student's teacher was found to lack the proper credentials. Twin Rivers filed its own complaint seeking a ruling that its February 25, 2014 IEP — which offered Student a school-based special day class placement — provided a FAPE in the least restrictive environment. The cases were consolidated and heard together.

What the District Did Wrong

The ALJ found that Twin Rivers denied Student a FAPE from March 24, 2012, through February 25, 2014 — nearly two years — by failing to offer or provide behavior support services. Twin Rivers' own IEP documents acknowledged that Student's behaviors impeded his learning, yet the district repeatedly sent a general education teacher with no behavior training to provide home instruction. That teacher testified he did not consider it his responsibility to address Student's behaviors and simply rescheduled sessions when Student acted out.

At the August 2012 IEP meeting, Twin Rivers did develop a behavior goal — but then failed to implement it. No special education teacher was assigned to deliver the services tied to that goal, and there was no evidence the home instructor was even aware the goal existed, let alone that he tracked Student's progress toward it. The ALJ found this a material failure to implement the IEP. At the December 2013 IEP meeting, Twin Rivers went further in the wrong direction: it dropped the behavior goal entirely, offering no behavior supports at all, even though the team agreed Student's behaviors continued to impede his learning. The district's ongoing effort to conduct a functional behavior assessment did not excuse its failure to serve Student's known needs in the meantime.

The ALJ rejected Parent's remaining claims. Student did not prove he had distinct sensory needs requiring sensory supports or physical therapy. On the fall 2013 gap in services, Twin Rivers quickly offered a qualified replacement instructor within about one week of discovering the credentialing problem — Parent's refusal to accept any instructor other than her preferred provider meant the district could not be held responsible for those missed weeks. The February 25, 2014 IEP offer of a special day class at Del Paso Heights Elementary, with a full-time aide and behavior consultation services, was found to be procedurally sound and substantively appropriate. The ALJ also found no evidence of predetermination, as the team meaningfully considered Parent's input and discussed multiple placement options.

What Was Ordered

1. Within 30 days of the decision, Twin Rivers must contract with a certified nonpublic agency or certified behaviorist to provide Student a bank of 34 hours of compensatory behavior services.
2. Up to 20 of those 34 hours must be used for training Parent and Student's grandmother on behavior strategies to support Student at school, delivered in the home or at school.
3. A minimum of 14 hours (up to all 34 hours if Parent declines to participate) must be delivered as direct behavior services to Student at school, targeting aggressive behaviors and improving coping skills.
4. Student must be able to access these services no later than 45 days from the decision date, and all services must be completed by the end of the 2014–2015 extended school year.
5. The February 25, 2014 IEP was upheld as offering a FAPE. Twin Rivers is permitted to implement it if Student returns to school.
6. Twin Rivers must provide a copy of the decision to the Juvenile Court within five days.

Why This Matters for Parents

1. A district cannot ignore known behavior needs just because a student is on home instruction. If a child's IEP documents that behaviors impede learning, the district must offer behavior supports regardless of the setting — home, school, or otherwise. Waiting for assessment results does not excuse failing to serve needs the district already knows about.

2. Writing a behavior goal into an IEP is not enough — the district must actually implement it. In this case, Twin Rivers wrote a behavior goal but then sent an untrained teacher who had no idea the goal existed. Courts treat this kind of gap between what an IEP promises and what actually happens as a serious violation.

3. Parents do not have the right to choose their child's specific service provider. The ALJ made clear that while Twin Rivers had to provide qualified home instruction, Parent was not entitled to insist on one particular instructor. When Twin Rivers offered a qualified replacement quickly, the district was not legally responsible for the weeks Parent refused that offer.

4. A school-based placement can be upheld even when a parent strongly prefers home instruction. Home instruction requires documented medical or clinical justification. If a district's offered school-based program is appropriate and reasonably designed for the child's needs, the fact that a parent prefers home instruction will not, by itself, make the school offer a denial of FAPE.