Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Testing - Out of compliance?

Can anyone here with knowledge of PA gifted ed mandates correct me if I'm wrong? I believe our district is entirely out of compliance in their testing and reporting timeframe.

My 1st grade daughter was tested by the district psychologist on Feb 6. I still have not received a Gifted Written Report. They do have a (tentative) GIEP meeting set up for two weeks from now, but have only casually discussed it being for the daughter who was just tested. As far as paperwork and documentation, the scheduled meeting is for my older child's annual GIEP.

This is concerning on several levels. We originally requested testing on Sept 8. The school then did a screening (SAGES) but we did not receive those results or the permission to test paperwork until Nov 24. I returned those forms Nov 28. In late January I asked why the testing had not happened yet, found out the psychologist had misplaced the paperwork or forgotten all about it, and then she scrambled and did the testing on Feb 6.

PA Chapter 16.22 states that "The initial evaluation shall be completed and a copy of the evaluation report presented to the parents no later than 60 calendar days after the agency receives written parental consent for evaluation..." I emailed the gifted support teacher the other night about how we still had not received the Gifted Written Report. I specifically mentioned that it had been 4 weeks since the test date, and 14 weeks since we had signed the permission to test. Yesterday while I was at the school volunteering, the principal mentioned that my email had been forwarded along to the psychologist (as well as the principal, apparently?) and that the GIEP meeting was scheduled and I'd get the report "before the meeting." The tone and implication is that I am unreasonable in my expectations. The gifted support teacher replied to the email just this morning, stating that "we can go ahead and plan to meet for (daughter 2) at 9:30 just after (daughter 1)'s meeting. I have been informed that you will get (daughter 2)'s report before the meeting." (There's a whole other issue here, in that daughter 1's meeting is scheduled for 9:15, so they've allotted a whole 15 minutes to hers, even though she is twice exceptional and partially-accelerated. But I'm picking my battles, always.)

Are they not obligated to have me sign the same form I did for daughter 2, agreeing to the meeting? Are they not obligated to provide the Gifted Written Report within the state mandated timeframe? I am tempted to go higher with this, but hesitate because I am very involved in the school and dread dealing with conflict drama. Being very involved, I am very well aware of the limited resources and various struggles they deal with daily. I think many gifted parents probably feel that their school does not take gifted ed seriously, but I would hope they would at least follow the law??

Thank you for reading. Please advise if you would let it go, take it further, etc. I value this community immensely.

I'm not in your state, and our state doesn't have GIEPS, but I will say that I've found it very difficult to get test results ahead of the meeting even for regular IEP meetings. I never get them at all unless I specifically ask for them ahead of time, and specify a date by which I would like to have them. Like, "I'm so glad we could find a time on March 10 that worked for everyone. Can you please be sure to email a copy of the draft by March 8? A digital copy is fine, so don't worry about sending a paper ahead of time."

And yes, I'd think you've have to consent to the time of the meeting in some manner.

We are in PA and we had our older two IDed as gifted. We did not bother with our youngest (now 13, 8th grade).

While I did not go over your entire timeline, the process was long. You'd fill out paperwork, return to the school district, get more paperwork that looked almost identical, fill out, return... Every time paperwork was with the district, they took as long as was permitted by law to process/respond. After all of that (which was months and months), they did some "pre-testing" and claimed the kids would never make the cut on the IQ test so you should stop the process to avoid getting the kid upset.

You pressed on, the district gave an IQ test of their choosing, administered by someone familiar with special ed students (not gifted kids), and finally the meeting was scheduled. All of this took the better part of a school year. We did this when our kids were in 7th grade.

I would not advise taking this to a higher level. This was the least of our struggles with the district admin folks. In our district, the biggest battles were in high school.

Without giving away your location, can you give us an idea of what part of PA we're talking about?

It sounds like they are out of compliance for the testing period and invitation to attend the meeting. I would see if you can get a parent advocate to double check that. I think there is a PA Gifted organization (PAGES?).

If they are out of compliance, I would consider documenting that in an email, but I would also consider not doing anything further about it at this time.

And yes, 15 minutes for an IEP meeting is ridiculously short. If that child is 2e, does she have a regular IEP with the GIEP included within? I think that is how it is supposed to work.

My question to you would be what you are hoping to accomplish?

They didn't provide the document in the defined time-frame. It sounds like there was a human error and they "scrambled" to react once they found out. What are you going to "go higher" with this for? It's not going to change history. It will likely just create the need on the school's part to be very formal, rigid, and semi-adversarial in future interactions.

They did not get your consent for a meeting. Again, it sounds like they're trying to rapidly respond to the error/time lag. Can you make the meeting? If not, tell them you can't make it and reschedule it. Being able to make the meeting but forcing them to cancel it and send you a formal notice of a future meeting so you can "approve" it - and delaying the meeting, which seems counterproductive to your concern above about delays? That doesn't seem to make sense.

I'm in PA and have worked very effectively with gifted advisers through 2 kids, 5 schools, and 21 student-years. We've worked to form a cooperative, collaborative relationship, even when I was disappointed in some outcomes/activities.

In your shoes, I'd attend the meeting and tell them that I understand the meeting was scheduled late, and ask how the scheduling/notification process will work for future meetings. I'd probably also explain that I understand there was human error in getting to this point, and ask how I can help facilitate the process in the future.

Unless you feel the administration is the adversary and you need to be in that type of relationship moving forward.