MISSOURI CITY, Texas — A Missouri City family will be a part of a state due process hearing Wednesday after claims that Fort Bend ISD is denying special education services to their child.
Larry George said his child, who has a learning disability and requires some special education services, has been with the district for about seven years now.
“He has a reading comprehension disability," George said. "He can be supported in a general ed setting with accommodations."
George has done everything he can outside the classroom to make sure his child succeeds in the classroom.
“He's had a tutor that supported him since second grade, and now he's a freshman, same tutor,” he said.
But according to George, Fort Bend ISD isn’t doing its part.
“There’s been numerous times where the IEP was not implemented," he said. "The support was not provided by the district."
An IEP stands for "Individualized Education Program," and education experts said it’s the basis of special education. The Texas Education Agency said the services can range in a variety of ways.
“Everything from modifications in the general education classroom to the far, you know, to the far end of the spectrum where kids are in a self-contained classroom,” said Justin Porter with the TEA.
This specific program is agreed upon between the school and the parents of the student, but George said Fort Bend ISD hasn’t been implementing the IEP they agreed upon.
“I have worked tirelessly with the district in trying to get them to collaborate and fix this,” said George.
George said he’s done all he can, even going to the TEA himself, who sided with him and put the district on a corrective action plan, but George said nothing has changed.
Eventually, George sought out help from special needs advocate Karen Mayer Cunningham.
“Every complaint Mr. George has filed without me has been substantiated that his complaints were valid,” said Cunningham.
Cunningham is no stranger to working with school districts when it comes to special education services and said resolving this issue has been more difficult than it should be.
“We simply are asking for the IEP to be implemented in the conformity that we agreed upon in the meetings, and they just will not do it,” said Cunningham.
KHOU 11 reached out to Fort Bend ISD officials who said they can’t comment publicly on the case to protect and respect the student’s privacy, but we learned that here in Texas, the George family isn’t alone in dealing with a situation like this.
“I interviewed about 25 parents across the state who have children with disabilities just to learn about their experiences navigating the process and virtually none of them had a positive experience at all,” said David DeMatthews, associate professor of education at the University of Texas at Austin.
DeMatthews said a lack of special education services has been a problem for years. In 2018, the Department of Education found the state was violating federal law.
“The state was failing to fulfill its monitoring responsibilities and failing to ensure that every child in Texas is proactively identified if they have an eligible disability and then provide it with, what is called, a free and appropriate public education,” said DeMatthews.
As challenges in education persist, George is just hoping his family’s can be solved.
“I’m exhausted," he said. "I’m looking for change in Fort Bend ISD."
In addition to that hearing set for Wednesday, a federal investigation is open with the Office of Civil Rights on Disability Retaliation and Race.
If you are the parent of a child who has a learning disability and you’ve faced similar obstacles or simply have questions, here are a few resources that can help: