The Fly Paper House Fly

A bulletin from the director on those sticky issues in special education

 

February 1, 2006

 

Related Services (OT, PT & A-PE) and the IEP

 

I am aware that there is some confusion regarding what is acceptable and what is not really acceptable when considering and listing the related services of Occupational Therapy, Physical Therapy and Adapted Physical Education on a student’s IEP.  In an effort to clear up the confusion I offer the following points:

 

§         You CAN have a related service of Occupational Therapy, Physical Therapy or Adapted PE listed on a student’s IEP as consult for longer than one trimester.  In the past I have said that it was not appropriate to have a student on a resource caseload as a consult student for longer than a trimester.  A related service, however, is different than an instructional program.  Occupational Therapy, Physical Therapy or A-PE can be provided on a consult basis.  There are times when the OT, PT or the A-PE Teacher simply needs to check in with teaching staff from time-to-time to make sure that the student’s needs are being met or that equipment is adjusted properly or that equipment is still needed, etc.  Therefore, it is acceptable to have any of these related services listed as being at a consult level for longer than one trimester.

 

§         On the related services screen (screen 48) of the eSped IEP, it is acceptable for a therapist or an APE Teacher to put a termination date for services that end therapy prior to the next IEP meeting.  For example, if the IPE meeting takes place in January of 2006, (with the annual review scheduled for January of 2007) the OT, PT or A-PE teacher can indicate that services will end in June of 2006.  It is not necessary to lock related service staff into a full year, if there is a logical reason to expect that the related services will no longer be needed after a specific date prior to the next annual review.  However, this decision should be directly related to the student’s IEP goals, and is only relative to the related services of OT, PT or A-PE.

 

§         You should be aware of our effort to move some of our related services to recommending monthly minutes on the IEP.  One of the reasons for this move is so that we can have some flexibility to “front load” or “back load” minutes rather than be locked into a weekly time schedule.  This makes it acceptable to write into a student’s IEP that initial staff training or initial equipment set-up is necessary.  Then, once that has been accomplished, the level of service will drop off.  This is often the case at the beginning of the school year, when a student is initially placed in a program, at the end of a school year, or at some other transition point. 

 

 

I hope that this information helps clear up some of the confusion that seems to be out there surrounding the related services of Occupational Therapy, Physical Therapy, and Adapted PE.  If you have specific questions, please remember that you can contact the district office at any time. 

 

 

 

 

Steven D. Castle, Director of Special Education

Oak Park Elementary District 97