The few students with disabilities who get better results are the ones whose parents doggedly fight for their children s statutory rights. With limited access to the legal system, these parents advocacy for their children is a long and uphill battle. In many cases, it is nearly impossible to achieve what has been guaranteed by law. The NCD report confirms these failures. Advocates can successfully reduce the tensions between an educational system that is not held accountable for the educational outcomes of its students with disabilities and the parents who are frustrated from trying to ensure that their sons and daughters achieve some level of acceptable success.
Many problems can be and are addressed.
At times more than lay advocacy is needed. It is a constant frustration that legal representation is very often unavailable for special education cases. Our democracy is based on a system of laws that is supposed to be enforceable. It is designed so that attorneys will help to enforce those laws. When a group of people are cut off from having equal access to the legal system, we no longer have democracy.