More than 1M Georgians lack access to reliable [...] internet .
must undertake while keeping students and employees safe from the pandemic .
3 . What Solutions Can Attorneys and Courts Offer ?
Education advocates can call on the GA DOE to issue uniform guidance to local school districts and to enforce current obligations . One way that attorneys can request additional guidance or to correct violations is to file a complaint with the Georgia DOE ’ s State Board of Education . For example , on October 9 , 2020 , attorney Julia Sullivan and social worker Erin O . Roma filed a complaint against the Savannah Chatham County School District alleging that the District violated the IDEA when it uniformly decided it would not provide any in-person services to any Chatham County student . A decision was rendered on February 12 , 2021 holding that the Savannah Chatham County School District was out of compliance with the IDEA . Unfortunately , the State Board of Education also found that the move solely to virtual learning was not per se predetermination . Sullivan , Esq . & Roma ( systemic ) v . Chatham City Sch . Dist ., case number 2021-339109 ( Ga . SBE , Feb . 12 , 2021 ). Next steps in the case are currently unknown .
Education advocates must be willing to represent individual students to ensure that their rights under IDEA are protected . This may mean attending an IEP meeting with students to ensure proper services
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are effectuated , or it may mean filing a due process complaint with the Office of State Administrative Hearings (“ OSAH ”).
The pandemic has widened the educational gap , especially for students with disabilities . As President Biden stated in his January 21 , 2021 Executive Order on education , “… every student in the United States should have the opportunity to receive a high-quality education , during and beyond the pandemic .” When we get past the pandemic , we likely will find that the gap between IEP eligible children and their peers without disabilities will only have widened . Families should ask schools to examine what deficiencies exist because of the remote learning and what the plan is for figuring out what kind of compensatory education for their children meets the requirements of FAPE , going forward .
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