Behind the Data: Why We Wrote Lag Time

Since then, our Navigators have supported more than 900 families through EBNHC. About 9 in 10 speak a first language other than English. While our Navigators support families with school enrollment, ensure support for emergent bilingual students who are new to English, and work through other K-12 academic concerns, the majority of referrals are for support with special education access. Navigators help families get their children necessary evaluations, working through the process of establishing an Individual Education Plan (IEP), and ensuring that students are receiving the interventions and accommodations they need.

Soon after launching this partnership, our Navigators started observing a pattern of challenges facing families. Here are some examples:

• A family would request an evaluation for their child through the appropriate channels, only to be told by the school that the person who conducts such evaluations is out on leave—so it can’t be done anytime soon.
• A Spanish-speaking parent would receive a copy of their child’s IEP—a legally binding document—in English only.
• A family would be told that the district was unable to complete a bilingual speech evaluation because they don’t have a staff member to do it.
• Again and again, processes that were supposed to take weeks would repeatedly stretch into months, delaying students entering school or receiving critical support services.

These missteps aren’t just inconveniences for families; they’re legal violations. Over and over, our Navigators observed school districts failing to comply with clearly established federal and state civil rights legislation, most notably including the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which was passed in 1975 to protect the rights of all students with disabilities to a “free and appropriate education.” IDEA dictates specific timelines and processes for ensuring that students receive the accommodations they need in school—processes school districts routinely fail to follow.

We wanted to understand just how common these failures—and wondered, too, what could be done about them. Today, we’re releasing Lag Time: How Policy Compliance Failures Delay Special Education Support for Boston-Area Children, which analyzes the experiences of 312 families who were actively supported by EdNavigator from September 2022 – January 2023.

Read more to find out what we learned, and what we think can be done to change it.