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Loudoun Now for March 30, 2023

Page 1

n LOUDOUN

4 | n POLITICS

VOL. 8, NO. 19

8 | n EDUCATION

12 | n PUBLIC NOTICES

24 | n OBITUARIES

We’ve got you covered. In the mail weekly. Online always at LoudounNow.com

Parents of Students with Disabilities See ‘Systemic’ Problems in School System BY ALEXIS GUSTIN

agustin@loudounnow.com

After seven years fighting to get her daughter an Individualized Education Program, Amanda Folks says she believes there are systemic problems within the school division when it comes to getting help for children with disabilities. “From my experience, I will say LCPS goes to great efforts to avoid the legal responsibility granted to students under IDEA,” she said. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act of 2004, or IDEA, is a law that gives free appropriate public education to eligible children with disabilities and ensures special education and related services to those children, according to the Department of Education. An IEP—a written educational program designed to meet a child’s individual needs—is the main way school divisions provide that education to eligible students. An IEP sets reasonable goals for a child and lists what services—such extra time to take a test, having a test read aloud, or extra resource time—will be provided by the district. Folks has been on a years-long mission to get her now 12-year-old daughter an IEP and accommodations to help with her disability. She said they have met roadblocks at every grade level.

School Board Approves Collective Bargaining See page 12

37

MARCH 30, 2023

County to Move Forward with Rt. 690 Interchange Amid Conflict with Town BY HANNA PAMPALONI AND RENSS GREENE

hpampaloni@loudounnow.com rgreene@loudounnow.com

their child has a particular disability in the hope that it will help them. Parents sometimes hire a special education advocate to help them know their rights. In 2021, after years of assessments and watching her daughter continue to struggle, Folks was determined to have her daughter get yet another assessment to see if once and for all her daughter could get the help she needed at school. She called

The county government is moving ahead with the Rt. 7/Rt.690 interchange with or without the town’s sign-off amid continuing conflict between the county and the Town of Purcellville around planned roads and parks in town. That project had stalled as members of the town’s Planning Commission and Town Council and some residents raised concerns about potential impacts on a floodplain near the Catoctin Meadows HOA to the southwest of the planned interchange. On Monday, Purcellville Mayor Stanley J. Milan wrote in an email to Purcellville resident and county Supervisor Tony R. Buffington (R-Blue Ridge) that trust between the two had been broken. “Your continuous peddling of lies and half-truths about the Town of Purcellville regarding the Fields Farm Project, 7/287 and the 7/690 projects, is unacceptable,” Milan wrote. “Your lack of integrity has shattered any trust that could have existed between us, and it is

IEP PROBLEMS continues on page 36

690 INTERCHANGE continues on page 37

Alexis Gustin/Loudoun Now

Whitney Mitchell holds her daughter Havilah at her home while she has a seizure. Mitchell said her daughter has many medical issues that require a nurse at school but said one hasn’t been hired yet.

To get an IEP a student is assessed and evaluated for six weeks in what is known as a child study, usually at the request of a parent although it can also be requested by a teacher or administrator. When the assessment is over, everyone who participated in it—the evaluators, the teacher or case manager, the eligibility coordinator, the student and parent—meet to look at the results and determine if the student has a disability. Sometimes parents bring in professionals or third-party assessments to show

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