District Failed to Address School Refusal for Two Years With No In-Person Assessments Since 2019

What Happened

A student with disabilities in the San Bernardino City Unified School District stopped attending school. For over two years, the student engaged in chronic school refusal — and the district did essentially nothing to address it.

No in-person assessments had been conducted since 2019. The district had no meaningful plan to re-engage the student in education. The IEP team continued to hold meetings and document goals, but without the student actually receiving educational services, those documents were meaningless exercises.

The parent filed for due process, and the ALJ took the unusual step of bifurcating the hearing — first determining whether the district was liable for FAPE denials, and then holding a separate proceeding on remedies. Bifurcation is rare in OAH proceedings and signals that the ALJ recognized the complexity and seriousness of the case.

What the District Did Wrong

Two Years of Inaction on School Refusal

School refusal is a complex issue that requires active intervention — not passive acceptance. When a student with disabilities stops attending school, the district has an obligation to investigate why, to assess whether the student's current program is appropriate, and to develop strategies to re-engage the student.

San Bernardino did none of this. For over two years, the student was essentially absent from education while the district failed to develop or implement any meaningful re-engagement plan.

No In-Person Assessments Since 2019

You cannot develop an appropriate IEP without current assessment data. By the time of the hearing, the district's most recent in-person assessment of the student was years old. The student's needs may have changed dramatically during the period of school refusal, but the district made no effort to conduct updated assessments that would capture the student's current functioning.

Inadequate Programming

Even during the periods when the student was nominally receiving services, the ALJ found the district's programming was inadequate. The IEP goals, services, and placement were not reasonably calculated to enable the student to make progress appropriate in light of their circumstances — the standard set by the Supreme Court in Endrew F.

What the Judge Found

ALJ Robert G. Martin found that San Bernardino City Unified denied the student FAPE across multiple areas. In the liability phase of the bifurcated hearing, the ALJ determined that the district failed to:

• Conduct timely and appropriate assessments in all areas of suspected disability
• Develop an IEP that was reasonably calculated to enable the student to make progress
• Provide an appropriate placement that addressed the student's school refusal
• Implement meaningful strategies to re-engage the student in education

The ALJ's decision to bifurcate the hearing itself was significant. By separating liability from remedies, the ALJ ensured that the full scope of the district's failures was established before determining what compensatory measures were needed to address them.

The ALJ found that the district's years of inaction in the face of chronic school refusal amounted to a substantive denial of FAPE. The student was not receiving an education at all, and the district's failure to act was not excused by the complexity of school refusal.

What Was Ordered

Following the remedies phase of the hearing, the ALJ ordered comprehensive relief including:

1. Updated assessments in all areas of suspected disability, conducted in person by qualified assessors

2. Compensatory educational services to address the years of lost educational opportunity during the period of school refusal

3. Development of a new IEP based on current assessment data that appropriately addresses the student's needs, including the school refusal behavior

4. An appropriate placement designed to re-engage the student in education

Why This Matters for Parents

School refusal is one of the most challenging situations parents face, and this decision makes clear that districts cannot simply throw up their hands when a student stops attending.

1. School refusal is the district's problem to solve. When a student with disabilities refuses to attend school, that refusal is often a symptom of the disability itself — or a sign that the current placement is not meeting the student's needs. Either way, the district has an obligation to investigate and act.

2. Old assessments cannot support a current IEP. Assessments from 2019 cannot form the basis of programming in 2023 or 2024. If your child's most recent assessment is more than two years old — or if your child's circumstances have changed significantly since the last assessment — the district should be conducting new assessments.

3. Bifurcated hearings signal serious cases. The ALJ's decision to bifurcate this hearing — splitting liability and remedies into separate proceedings — is unusual and indicates the ALJ recognized this as a case involving significant, multi-year violations requiring careful remedies analysis.

4. Document the absence and the silence. If your child is refusing to attend school and the district is not actively working to address it, document every day of absence. Document every time you contact the district about the situation. Document every IEP meeting where school refusal is not meaningfully addressed. That pattern of documented inaction is your evidence.

5. The IEP must address barriers to attendance. An IEP that lists goals and services but does not address the fundamental reason a student is not attending school is not "reasonably calculated to enable progress." If your child is not attending, the IEP team needs to determine why and develop a concrete plan.

If your child has stopped attending school and the district is not taking meaningful action, do not wait. Request an IEP meeting in writing, specifically asking the team to address the school refusal. If the team does not develop a concrete re-engagement plan with timelines and accountability, that failure is evidence for a due process complaint.