Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/16pdf/15-827_0pm1.pdf
Page Number: 9.0

Cite as:  580 U. S. ____ (2017) 

5 

Opinion of the Court 

blanche to impose upon the States whatever burden their 
various  judgments  indicate  should  be  imposed.”  Rowley, 
458  U. S.,  at  190,  n. 11.    After  all,  the  statutory  phrase
“free  appropriate  public  education”  was  expressly  defined 
in  the  Act,  even  if  the  definition  “tend[ed]  toward  the
cryptic rather than the comprehensive.”  Id., at 188.  This 
Court  went  on  to  reject  the  “equal  opportunity”  standard 
adopted  by  the  lower  courts,  concluding  that  “free  appro-
priate  public  education”  was  a  phrase  “too  complex  to  be
captured  by  the  word  ‘equal’  whether  one  is  speaking  of 
opportunities  or  services.”  Id.,  at  199.  The  Court  also 
viewed  the  standard  as  “entirely  unworkable,”  apt  to
require  “impossible  measurements  and  comparisons”  that
courts were ill suited to make.  Id., at 198. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Court  also  rejected  the  school 
district’s argument that the FAPE requirement was actu-
ally no requirement at all.  Id., at 200.  Instead, the Court 
carefully  charted  a  middle  path.    Even  though  “Congress 
was  rather  sketchy  in  establishing  substantive  require-
ments”  under  the  Act,  id.,  at  206,  the  Court  nonetheless 
made  clear  that  the  Act  guarantees  a  substantively  ade-
quate program of education to all eligible children,  id., at 
200–202,  207;  see  id.,  at  193,  n. 15  (describing  the  “sub-
stantive standard . . . implicit in the Act”).   We explained 
that this requirement is satisfied, and a child has received 
a FAPE, if the child’s IEP sets out an educational program
that is “reasonably calculated to enable the child to receive 
educational  benefits.”  Id.,  at  207.   For  children  receiving
instruction in the regular classroom, this would generally 
require  an  IEP  “reasonably  calculated  to  enable  the  child 
to  achieve  passing  marks  and  advance  from  grade  to 
grade.”  Id., at 204; see also id., at 203, n. 25. 

In  view  of  Amy  Rowley’s  excellent  progress  and  the 
“substantial”  suite  of  specialized  instruction  and  services
offered  in  her  IEP,  we  concluded  that  her  program  satis-
fied the FAPE requirement.  Id., at 202.  But we went no