Helpful Terms

Evaluation: A procedure used to determine whether a child has a disability and the nature and extent of the special education and related serves that the child needs.

FAPE: Free (at no cost to parents), Appropriate (suited to the individual needs of the child), Public (provided by, or paid for by, the public school system) Education.

IEP: -An Individualized Education Program is a written statement of the needs, interests, and abilities of an eligible student with a disability, developed in a team meeting to provide the goals and objectives of the students individualized education program.

LRE: Least Restrictive Environment implies that to the maximum extent appropriate, children with disabilities are to be educated with their non-disabled peers. Removal form the regular education environment occurs only when t he nature of severity of the disability is such that education in regular classes cannot be achieved satisfactorily.

RTI: (Response to Intervention):

RTI: RTI is a set of systematic and data-based instructional processes for identifying, defining, and resolving students' academic and/or behavioral problems. RTI is a multi-tiered approach that provides services and interventions to struggling learners at increasing levels of intensity. The RTI approach must use a systematic process with a continuum of intervention options to determine if the child responds to scientific, research-based interventions.

Special Education: The term special education means specially designed instruction, at no cost to parents, to meet the unique needs of the child with a disability.