A new report finds that court decisions related to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) are more likely to be litigated in some states than others. An analysis published in the Journal of Special Education Leadership reported that 10 states account for nearly two thirds of all court decisions.
In the 34-year period between 1979 and 2013, there were over 5,000 court decisions related to legal questions under IDEA. Nearly 600 of those decisions came out of New York, while Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C. each accounted for about 500 decisions. New Jersey joined California, Illinois, Hawaii, Texas, Connecticut, and Virginia as among the top 10 states in the nation for special education court decisions. North Dakota, Wyoming, Utah, and Montana saw less than 10 court decisions apiece related to IDEA in that same 34-year period.
When the researchers considered the number of students with disabilities in each state, they found that some jurisdictions — notably Washington, D.C. and Hawaii — had significantly more litigation per capita than others. At the same time, some high enrollment states like Florida and Texas had proportionately fewer court decisions.
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