| The Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004 (IDEA) contains procedural safeguard provisions for parents [20 U.S.C. § 615]. Among these safeguards are (1) dispute resolution, (2) mediation, and (3) administrative hearing. Getty and Summy (2004) contend that some district litigation could be prevented if districts were aware of the factors which may cause a parent to file for a contested case hearing. Best practice variables for students with significant cognitive disabilities were identified from the literature (Browder & Spooner, 2006; Snell & Brown, 2006), and legislative variables were also identified from IDEA (2004). Survey methodology was used to examine the relationship of the best practice and legislative variables and school district litigation. The respondents included 173 special education administrators from North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia. The results showed little variability in the dependent variable resulting in a lack of statistical significance. While results did not indicate significance for variables affecting litigation, descriptive analysis revealed that respondents self-evaluated their systems much higher on legislative than best practice variables. Implications for practice indicated a need for professional development for special education administrators in the area of best practices for students with significant cognitive disabilities. Implications for future research included expanding the study to include more states or the possibility of a comparative case study focused on identifying variables associated with school district litigation for this population of students. |
