A New Jersey Administrative Law Judge denied a set of parents’ request for their daughter with disabilities to remain in her private school placement, in spite of the fact that her behavior was found to be a result of her disabilities.
The case involves a 16-year-old girl with psychiatric, emotional, and behavioral disabilities who had been placed in three out-of-district programs since 2013.
Following a string of disciplinary infractions, administrators at the third program — a state-approved private school — recommended that the girl be placed in yet another program. When the district convened an IEP meeting and proposed a fourth out-of-district program, the student’s parents rejected the change and sought emergent relief, asking that the girl remain at her current program.
Within weeks of that IEP meeting, however, the student was suspended for drug-related issues and later was arrested for making terroristic threats. Although the manifestation determination confirmed that the girl’s behavior was directly related to her emotional disabilities, the district nonetheless proposed an immediate change in placement to a new out-of-district school as the 45-day alternative interim placement, citing the girl’s dangerous behavior.
The judge found that the school district and the private school both have a right and a responsibility to maintain order and safety and also that the girl’s parents failed to show that she would suffer great harm if removed from one private school and instead remained at her interim setting. OAL 15798-14
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