How to Read an IEP: Maine

Understanding Parent Concerns, Disability Statements, and Most Recent Asssessments

Maine IEP Guide: Parent Input and Concerns

What Is It?
What Does It Look Like?
What Does The IEP Say?
How Do I Know If It Is Good?

What is the parents concerns section of an IEP?

While IEPs are supposed to be created by an IEP team that includes the parent, in reality almost all IEPs are written before the meeting. This box is the one section exclusively reserved for parents, where they can express their concerns, hopes, and goals for the student. Some districts also have additional boxes for parent input, but most just have the one box for parents.

Where is the parent concerns section found?

Variable but towards the beginning of the IEP. Often it is before the present levels section.

How does the section for parent concerns and input vary across states and districts?

Zero variation. Really. This is always titled parent concerns and it is always a stand alone section in an IEP. If you know of an exception to that, let me know but I have never seen one.

This IEP comes from Lives in the Balance. See the full IEP here.

Because the images are hard to read, a transcript is below.

Concerns of the parents for enhancing the education of their child.

Student X’s parents are concerned with the fact that X can’t make friends. They are worried about his education and want to see him like coming to school.

This should NEVER be filled in prior to the IEP unless there was a long talk between the special education teacher and the parent. If it is, and you a parent, that is a red flag that the IEP is likely to be very sloppy and you should have someone with you at the meeting. It is a bad sign. For folks reading the IEP after a meeting, ideally you should get a sense of what the parents are thinking about. TBH, 99% of these state that the parent wants the student to be successful in school. If you see more than that, just know that you have a great IEP team at your school.

Maine IEP Guide: Disability Statement

What Is It?
What Does It Look Like?
What Does The IEP Say?
How Do I Know If It Is Good?

What is the disability statement?

In most states, the student’s disability is identified in two places. First, on the cover page, it states what the primary (and secondary if relevant) is, like Autism or a learning disability. Then, later in the IEP, there is a statement on how the disability affects the student’s progress in the general education curriculum. In a few places, these are combined, but that is pretty rare. Generally, you look to the front page to get a sense of why the student qualifies for special education and later to understand how it impacts them.

Here are some examples. In Tennessee, the front page of the IEP states the disability which, for their sample, is an intellectual disability. Then on page 2, right after parent concerns, you get the disability statement which says, “Describe how the student’s disability affects involvement and progress in the general curriculum: Rocio’s ability to master regular classroom academic objectives is markedly delayed. She benefits from small group instruction and repetition to learn skills. She tries to complete various assignments, but struggles doing basic tasks. She is significantly below grade level in her academics. This impacts her mastery of standards and participation in the general education classroom “

In Oregon, the front page of the sample IEP says a learning disability and then after present levels they have the disability statement, which reads; “Describe how student’s disability affects involvement and progress in the general education curriculum has deficits noted above with his writing skills that will need to be addressed through direct instruction and through accommodations and/or modifications in the general classroom to respond to instruction or assessments. difficulties with writing may affect his ability to effectively complete class room assignments, note taking and homework. These difficulties will also impact his ability to convey his thoughts through written words.”

Arizona is a bit odd. It says on the front page of the sample IEP that the child qualifies under OHI, but then there is no separate box for the disability statement. Instead, it is embedded in the present levels and says, “Kyra qualifies as a student with Attention Deficit Disorder-Hyperactive Type (ADHD). She also has co-morbidity of Reactive Attachment Disorder. Due to her inability to self-regulate within the academic setting, This impedes progress without the support and services of special education. Due to this her ability to generalize on her academic performance and one on one testing in the classroom, her environment is greatly impaired. Her ability to self-soothe and regulate, as well as relate to others around her is a weak area for her.” That is the statement of disability– they just don’t have a separate box for it.

The statement of disability should refer to and explain the primary disability and how it impacts the student’s learning.

Where is the disability statement found in the IEP?

Split between the front page and the present levels or parent concerns.

How do disability statements vary across districts and states?

Varies in placement, phrasing, and whether or not it can be edited between three year reviews.

This IEP comes from Lives in the Balance. See the full IEP here.

Because the images can be hard to read, a transcript is below.

2. DISABILITY

☐ Autism
☐ Deaf-Blindness
☐ Deafness
☐ Developmental Delay (3–5)
☐ Developmental Delay (Kindergarten)
☐ Emotional Disturbance
☐ Hearing Impairment
☐ Intellectual Disability
☐ Visual Impairment (including Blindness)
☒ Other Health Impairment
☐ Orthopedic Impairment
☐ Speech or Language Impairment
☐ Specific Learning Disability
☐ Traumatic Brain Injury
☐ Multiple Disability (list concomitant disabilities)

How the child’s disability affects the child’s involvement and progress in the general education curriculum.
Student X’s processing difficulties, weak memory, and deficits in reading development skills specifically in decoding, fluency and comprehension are making it difficult for him to participate in tasks and activities that are on grade level.

You should be able to read this and understand how the disability affects the student’s progress in the curriculum. Note that in NH it can be hard to read these and know how the child is qualifying for special education. That is true in a few other states, but in most it is really clear what the disability is and why it was considered to be academically significant enough to get the student an IEP.

Maine IEP Guide: Results of Most Recent Assessments

What Is It?
What Does It Look Like?
What Does The IEP Say?
How Do I Know If It Is Good?

What is the results of the most recent assessments section on an IEP?

This is a section that isn’t in all IEPs. Many states/districts, however, have a box in the present levels to put in test results. Typically, this is the results of the formal assessments the student took at their three year review or their initial evaluation. You will often see a lot of standard scores, percentiles, and gobbly gook here. Sometimes districts will also include transition assessments done by case managers, class grades, and state test results here as well.

Because IEPs are written on all areas of student need, present levels sections include information on the student’s physical, socioemotional, development, and communication baseline as well as on their academics. There is a lot of variation in how districts label the various parts of this section but in every single one you should learn about a student’s skills in reading, writing, mathematics, and their overall development. In most districts that means communication, motor skills, and socioemotional skills– but some districts jumble those together and so omit any areas where the student does not have a need. In California, that would have gotten you in trouble on a state audit but in New Hampshire it is pretty standard not to see anything about motor skills in an IEP– so there is some variation state by state.

Arizona, which combines this section with the student strengths, has a nice clean lay out for this section. Click read more to see how Arizona divided up this section in the sub-sections I talked about of communication, academics, and so on.

Now, take a look at this section of the IEP from the Fresno district in California. They too have a section for communication and motor skills, but academic and functional skills are one sub-section that also includes socioemotional stuff.

The IEP from Oregon has only two sub-boxes– one for academic performance and one for developmental and functional development. In NH (not shown), there are three boxes– one for academic performance, one for functional, and one for developmental– and no one really has a clue how to figure out what goes in the functional versus developmental boxes!

You can see that the amount of content in the boxes varies a lot as does their labels but somehow, every single IEP from every single district is trying to provide a holistic picture of the student’s skills.

The filled out examples on the left are helpful to look at to get a sense of how long this section can be– because when I say this is the meatiest section of the IEP, I mean it is the longest!

Where is the most recent assessments section found on an IEP?

If it is in the IEP, and it is often not (some districts put it in a separate document instead because it is long and kinda boring), it will mostly be with the present levels.

How does the most recent assessments section vary across states and districts?

In San Diego, we never ever put this in the IEPs, just in assessment reports. In NH, this information is in every IEP. So your IEPs might have standard scores and gobbly gook– or might not. If it doesn’t, you can always request the assessment report which has the scores in context. If you just don’t like the gobbly gook, get the assessment report. They are MUCH easier to understand!

This IEP comes from Lives in the Balance. See the full IEP here.

Because the images are hard to read, a transcript is below.

4. RESULTS OF ALL INITIAL EVALUATIONS OR MOST RECENT EVALUATION OF THE CHILD.

Results of evaluations:
KTEA Kaufman Test of Educational Achievement September 2016 (85–110 is average)

	Standard Scores	95% Confidence Interval	Percentile rank
Reading Composite	79	81–93%	6th
Reading Comprehension	80	75–85	9th
Letter/Word Recognition	78	72–83	7th
Reading fluency	78	72–83	7th
Writing Composite	77	71–83	6th
Written Expression	72	62–82	3
Spelling	81	76–86	10
Math Composite	92	81–93%	22
Math Concepts & applications	90	78–98%	21
Math Computation	98	81–93%	22

Gallistel Ellis Test of Decoding 2016:
Phonic Structures: Closed Syllables with single consonants 80%, blends and Digraphs 65%, Silent e words with soft c and g 72%, vowel teams and vowel‑r 73%, multi‑syllable and irregular words 65%, nonsense syllables 58%.
Due to the low score with nonsense syllables STUDENT X relies on sight memory rather than truly understanding how to decode syllable types.

Intellectual testing Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children WISC IV 2016 indicates intact cognitive functioning with a general abilities index of 87, 19th percentile.
STUDENT X performs in the average range for verbal comprehension 92 and visual spatial 100, with low average range for fluid reasoning 89, working memory 88, and processing speed 86.
STUDENT X continues to exhibit deficits in verbal and visual memory as well as attention/concentration tasks requiring these skills. He performs in the low average range for verbal memory 82 and visual memory 85, with low attention/concentration 79 and general memory index 85.
STUDENT X has difficulty with tasks requiring rote memorization, recall of previously presented information and material that is presented visually for later consideration.

If you are a general education teacher? Avoid it. This is a DENSE jargon section. In actual psychologist reports and formal reports, the assessors include interpretations of the results using English, not jargon. If the results are pasted into the IEP though they are often just numbers with no context or explanation. If you are a dedicate parent or a masochist though, you should read to look for 1) what types of tests were given? For example, if you see a Connor’s, that means folks were looking at ADHD. If you see a WISC, they were looking at cognitive functioning, and so on. 2) how did the student do? Hopefully, there are standard scores or percentiles given. Generally, if you see low scores, it means that is an area of weakness for a student and might appear in their disability statement as something that makes accessing the general education curriculum challenging.