Opinion ID: 626043
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Mixed Question

Text: We turn now to the mixed question of law and fact, which is whether the 2005 IEP complied with the IDEA because it was reasonably calculated to confer a meaningful educational benefit. The IHO's opinion as to the adequacy of the 2005 IEP was based on findings that D.B.'s previous IEPs had resulted in meaningful advancement, and that the 2005 IEP kept in place the therapy and tutoring services offered by the previous IEPs, while supplementing those services with the multi-sensory, structured learning program recommended by Dooley-Smith: [D.B.'s] progress was meaningful. Despite enormous challenges, [D.B.] developed from a child who did not speak at all and only had access to a few signs to a child who could communicate many of his wants and needs via sign, spoken words, and emerging use of augmentative communication, who was developing pre-reading skills, whose physical skills had improved enormously. There is no reason to believe that [D.B.] would not have made continued, and likely more rapid progress in the newly-proposed program. The district court also looked to D.B.'s progress under his previous IEPs and agree[d] with the IHO that this progress, even if less than optimal, was likely to continue under the new IEP and would have been sufficient to satisfy the IDEA. It was not error for the IHO and the district court to conclude retrospectively that D.B.'s previous IEPs had resulted in meaningful educational benefits. While in the Sutton school system, D.B. had developed from a nonverbal and unfocused child into a total communicator who, by the time the 2005 IEP was scheduled to be implemented, knew over one hundred words, spoke short phrases, followed simple directions, was more focused, and could identify seven written words and the numerals 0 through 15. Even without knowing the upper limit of D.B.'s potential for learning and self-sufficiency, we have no trouble concluding that these achievements were meaningful for him, and advanced him measurably toward the goal of increased learning and independence. See R.P. ex rel. C.P. v. Prescott Unified Sch. Dist., 631 F.3d 1117, 1123 (9th Cir.2011) (upholding district court's conclusion that IEP delivered meaningful benefit on analogous facts). [4] It also was not error to conclude prospectively that, since D.B.'s previous IEPs had conferred meaningful educational benefits, the 2005 IEP was reasonably calculated to do the same, having kept in place, and even supplemented, the services offered by the previous IEPs. See Jeff P., 540 F.3d at 1153. Accordingly, we affirm the district court's grant of summary judgment on the IDEA claim raised in Count 10.