Special Education Appeal Board and Tribunal FAQs

1. What is a Special Education Appeal Board? This is the first avenue of re-course for parents. If parents disagree with the decision of the IPRC (Identification Placement and Review Committee) concerning the identification and placement of their exceptional children, they may appeal the decision. A Special Education Appeal Board (SEAB) is comprised of three members: one member selected by the school board; one member chosen by the parent; and a chair, selected jointly by the board and parent members, or where those members can’t agree, by the appropriate district manager of the Ministry of Education. The full procedure for the Appeal process is outlined in Ontario Regulation 181/98 of the Education Act.¹

2. What is a Tribunal? If parents are still not satisfied with the recommendation of the SEAB or the school board’s response to the recommendation, the next step is to proceed to a formal Tribunal. Application to request a Tribunal is then filed with the Secretary of the Special Education Tribunal to schedule a hearing.² The Ontario Special Education Tribunal provides final and binding decisions in the event of disagreements between parent(s)/guardians(s) and school boards concerning the identification or placement of exceptional pupils. A Tribunal is a legal hearing which falls under the Statutory Powers Procedure Act. A Tribunal is comprised of two members and one chair. Appearances occur for the appellant or parent representing the child; the respondent or representative for the school board; and witnesses for the appellant and witnesses for the respondent. The decision of the Tribunal is final and binding on the school board and the parents.

3. What is the relationship between the Ministry of Education and the school boards’ Special Education Plan? The Ministry of Education has the authority to review school boards’ Special Education Plans and hold school boards accountable to those plans. Regulation 306 defines the requirement for each school board to maintain a special education plan and sets out the authority for the Minister of Education to require a school board to amend its plan if necessary. “Amending the plan will include responding to identified omissions. Boards will make the necessary changes and submit the amendments to the ministry the following year.” ³

4. Why are Tribunals becoming more common? One reason identified by Brenda Bowlby, co-author of An Educator’s Guide to Special Education Law, is that “a straight reading of the legislation makes clear that only placement and identification can be appealed. However, placement is not defined in the legislation and can, by its nature, involve program and even services, but not always.” This may create problems for the parties. A clearer definition of what precisely can be appealed as part of placement would be helpful.” ⁴ Another reason why tribunals may be becoming more common is that identification procedures and criteria and placement alternatives for gifted students are still not standard across the province. As a result of the lack of consistent program delivery across Ontario or the lack of suitable placement alternatives, or consistent appropriate identification criteria, an increasing number of parents must resort to the Appeals/Tribunal processes as a means to seek alternatives to the identification and/or placement decision of the IPRC. After several years of consultations with groups representing children of all exceptionalities and school boards, the Ministry of Education has yet to release program standards. The initiative was announced January 2000, and the consultation process took several years.⁵ In the fall of 2003, the Ministry released a pilot test for the proposed program standards for the autism exceptionality. ABC believes that program standards for all exceptionalities could bring clarity to District School Boards’ Special Education Plans with respect to their obligations to exceptional children.

5. How can I network with other parents who have experienced the Tribunal process? Your local ABC Chapter is a great place to start. (If you live in an area without an active chapter, please contact Provincial ABC.) Your Chapter President may know of another member from your chapter or another chapter, who may be willing to share their experience with you. Each Tribunal involves different identification and placement issues and therefore different rulings. Public details of one Tribunal in particular can be found on the ABC Cornwall web site. ⁶ You will appreciate from reading about this family’s experience that the Tribunal process can be an exhausting and difficult process. The Tribunal in this case ruled that the student be identified as gifted and that the school board would provide a placement for that student in a gifted secondary program that would meet the student’s needs. This ruling required that services be purchased from an adjacent school board, with transportation and other additional costs to be assumed by the current school board.

6. How can my local ABC Chapter help? Parents should contact their local school board’s Special Education Advisory Committee (SEAC) ABC representative as an important step in the process. ABC Ontario has appointed members across Ontario whom volunteer extra time to participate on their school board’s SEAC. SEACs make recommendations to their school boards regarding the identification, placement alternatives and program delivery for exceptional students. One important way in which SEACs can advocate for changes in a school board’s Special Education Plan is to file a disagreement with the plan in the form of a minority report, requiring amendments to be pursued.

7. How can ABC Ontario help? As well as providing connections to other parents, ABC may be able to provide a list of people to consider as the parent’s candidate for an appeal board member or appeal board chairperson. In 1997, ABC Ontario established a Tribunal Fund to help members who need to resort to the Tribunal process to advocate for their gifted children, to help offset some of the associated costs. An ABC Ontario member who is in good standing on the date of the tribunal request, who is proceeding to tribunal on behalf of their child enrolled in a District School Board in Ontario, and who continues to be a member in good standing throughout the tribunal proceedings, may request funds from ABC Ontario upon submission of the completion of the tribunal decision. A request must be submitted in writing to the ABC Ontario Provincial Executive, including a copy of the Request for Tribunal, a copy of the Appeal Board decision, and receipts for all expenses included in the request. The written request must be received within 365 days of the written Tribunal decision. The use of the fund is designated for the reasonable costs incurred by the member family in the proceedings of a Tribunal with regard to gifted identification and/or placement of a gifted student. A maximum grant of $500 may be made to the member per Tribunal case.⁷

8. Are there any resource materials you could recommend? Parents should familiarize themselves with their School Board’s Special Education Plan as well as the applicable regulations of the Education Act to know what their rights are. In addition to several regulations already mentioned, others to review would include: Education Act R.S.O. 1990 c E.2 Section 170 (1) 7 8 which requires that “school boards provide or enter into an agreement with another board to provide in accordance with the regulations special education programs and services for exceptional pupils”. Notably, the Ministry has just launched a new web site initiative that will, for the first time, have all the information on Special Education located on one site. This new site has the history of Special Education, program and policy information and links to other Special Education sites. This site is an important training and reference tool for school boards, teachers, parents and SEACs and can be found at www.seaclearning.com.

References:
1. Ministry of Education document: Special Education, A Guide for Educators 2001; www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/general/elemsec/speced/guide.html
2. http://mettowas21.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/general/elemsec/speced/speced.html. Scroll to the bottom of the menu and find “Special Education Tribunals” under the “Related Information” title.
3. Find also in same site as reference 1 above .
4. www.canadalawbook.ca/headlines/headline219arc.html
5. Standards for School Boards’ Special Education Plans (2000), www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/general/elemsec/speced/iepstand/iepstand.pdf.
6. www.abcottawa.cyberus.ca//cornwall.htm
7. ABC Ontario Document: Guidelines for Access to ABC Ontario Tribunal Fund, January 28, 2002
8. Go to www.google.com and perform search for “Education Act R.S.O. 1990”. Select section 57 for information about the Tribunal process section 170 ( 7) regarding boards entering into agreements with other school boards when necessary to provide special education programs and services.