The entire following italicized paragraph was taken from “Educating

Children with Autism.” This was a project requested by the US Depart6ment

of Education’s Office of Special Education Programs to be undertaken by
the National Research Council to Consider the State of the Scientific
Evidence of the Effects of Early Educational Intervention on Young
Children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders.

It is recommended that educational services begin as soon as a child is

suspected of having autistic spectrum disorder. Those services should
include a minimum of 25 hours a week, 12 months a year in which the child
is engaged in a systematically planned and developmentally appropriate
educational activity toward identified objectives and sufficient amounts of
adult attention in one to one… instruction to meet individual goals. Each
child must receive sufficient individualized attention on a daily basis so that
adequate implementation of objectives can be carried out effectively. The
priorities of focus include functional spontaneous communication, social
instruction delivered throughout the day in various settings, cognitive
development and play skills and proactive approaches to behavior
problems… the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act contains the
necessary provisions for ensuring the rights to appropriate education for
children with autistic spectrum disorders… Teachers and other professionals
and paraprofessionals who often provide the bulk of service to the very
young children need familiarity with the course of autistic spectrum
disorders and the range of possible outcomes and with the many methods
that fit into best practices specific problems in generalization and
maintenance of behaviors also affect the kind of training needed as does the
wide range of IQ’s and verbal skills associated with autistic spectrum
disorders from profound mental retardation and severe language
impairments to high intelligence. A child’s hearing should be tested, but
behavioral problems may sometimes complicate assessment. Definitive
documentation of adequate hearing levels should then be obtained through
other methods… For a child with an autistic spectrum disorder to be
included in mainstream settings; the child must be able to manage social
experiences. This requires careful consideration on the part of school staff.
These social difficulties, as reflected in relationships with teachers and
particularly in relationships with peers, are different from those seen in all
other developmental disorders and present special difficulties for
programming…from the time of Kanner’s (1943) definition of autism, social
deficits have been constantly identified as an, if not the essential feature of
the condition. Social interaction requires careful attention to multiple,
shifting strands of information: an ability to perceive the thoughts, feelings
and intentions of others and coping with novel situations on a regular basis.
In children with autistic spectrum disorders, social difficulties may change
with age and intervention… Screening…the symptoms of autism are often
measurable by 18-months of age. The main characteristics that differentiate
autism from other developmental disorders in the 20-month to 36-month age
range involve behavioral deficits in eye contact, orienting to one’s name,
joint attention behaviors (e.g. pointing, showing pretend play, imitation,
non-verbal communication and language development). There are three
published screening instruments in the field that focus on children with
autism: The checklist for autism in toddlers (chart), the autism screening
questionnaire and the screening test for autism in two-year-olds. The chart is
designed to screen for autism at 18 months of age. The autism screening
questionnaire is a new 40-item screening scale that has good discriminating
validity between autistic spectrum and either disorders, including non-
autistic mild or moderate mental retardation in children aged 4 years and
older, a score of 1 is given for an item if the abnormal behavior is present
and a score of 0 if the behavior is absent. The cutoff for consideration of a
diagnosis of autism is a score of 15 or higher. There are additional
instruments undergoing validation studies. The Austrian Scale for
Asperger’s Syndrome and the Pervasive Developmental Disorders Screening
Test – II (PODST – II) is a clinically derived parent questionnaire
assessment… several principles underlie assessment of a young child with
autism or autistic spectrum disorder. (S.S. Sparrow., 1997 -
Developmentally based assessment in handbook of autism and persuasive
developmental disorders, D.J. Cohen and F.R. Volume New York: John
Loiley and Sons, Inc,…) careful documentation of a child’s unique strengths
and weaknesses can have a major impact on the design of effective
intervention programs and is particularly critical because unusual
developmental profiles are common. Given the amount of difficulty, the
efforts of professionals from various disciplines are often needed (e.g.
psychology, speech and language, pathology, neurology, psychiatry).
(Citation) NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL (2001). EDUCATING
CHILDREN WITH AUTISM, COMMITTEE ON EDUCATIONAL
INTERVENTIONS FOR CHIILDREN WITH AUTISM. CATHERINE
LORD AND JAMES P MCGEE, eds. DIVISION OF BEHAVIORAL AND
SOCIAL SCIENCES AND EDUCATION. WASHINGTON, DC:
NATIONAL ACADEMY PRESS. 8TH PRINTING OCTOBER 2005

History
The Parents in the above-captioned matter request that the Hearing Officer’s
decision be reversed and the Parents be named prevailing parties because the
decision cannot be supported because an error the law has been committed
and the record read in its entirety would compel a contradictory conclusion.
Also the H.O. has abused its discretion in reaching his decision such that
Parents have experienced extreme prejudice in their case which would
justify the decision be reversed in favor of the Parents for a denial of FAPE.

The issues are a lack of Child Find, substantive and procedural errors, no
prior written notice, and lack of credibility of witnesses to support decision.

Kirsten Riley is an eight-year-old former Philadelphia School District

Student who is now being home schooled because the district could not
provide a FAPE, nor could they maintain a safe physical learning
environment for K.R. at school. The parents removed K.R. from the Solis
Cohen Elementary School in March 2005 because Kirsten had been
assaulted in class by fellow students while the teacher was present and
because K.R. was not receiving a free and appropriate education while a
student in the district.

K.R. entered the Philadelphia School District through the early intervention
program at the age of five-and-a-half. She was identified as having ADHD
and congenital brain damage and a student who was in need of special
education and related services. As a result of the parents filing a due process
request in May of 2005, Kirsten was independently re-evaluated by two
psychologists who diagnosed K.R. with autism spectrum disorder (ASD)
Pervasive Developmental Disorders -