Opinion ID: 551748
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Whether the IEP failed to meet the Act's content requirements.

Text: Under EAHCA, each IEP must include: 15 (A) a statement of the present levels of educational performance of [the] child, (B) a statement of annual goals, including short-term instructional objectives, (C) a statement of the specific educational services to be provided to [the] child, and the extent to which [the] child will be able to participate in regular educational programs, (D) the projected date for initiation and anticipated duration of such services, and (E) appropriate objective criteria and evaluation procedures and schedules for determining, on at least an annual basis, whether instructional objectives are being achieved. 16 20 U.S.C. Sec. 1401(19). Because an IEP is crucial to helping the handicapped child, the Supreme Court requires strict review to determine its procedural adequacy. Rowley, 458 U.S. at 207 n. 27. 17 Tara's IEP stated her present educational level as follows: (1) Tara shows expressive-receptive vocabulary deficiency, and (2) It was reported that Tara may be experiencing difficulties in vocabulary, grammatical comprehension and figurative language. Tara contests the sufficiency of this statement because it fails to contain the objective measurable terms necessary to determine whether the IEP corrected Tara's impairment. For this reason, Tara argues, the entire document must fail. 18 Our circuit recently addressed the issue of an IEP's content requirements in Doe by and through Doe v. Defendant I, 898 F.2d 1186 (6th Cir.1990). In Doe, the appellants argued that the IEP was invalid because it did not include a present educational performance level and lacked objective criteria to determine the achievement of objectives. The Sixth Circuit found that to say these technical deviations from section 1401(19) render appellant's IEP invalid is to exalt form over substance. Doe, 898 F.2d at 1190. The appellant's education was not affected by these deficiencies because all of the parties involved possessed the knowledge which was omitted by the IEP: the student's most recent grades. Id. Furthermore, this decision did not violate the strict compliance requirement of Rowley because Rowley emphasized the procedures for developing the IEP and ensuring parental participation; these facets of the IEP were not at issue in Doe, nor in the present case. Id. at 1190-91. If the IEP in Doe complied with EAHCA's procedural requirements, then Tara's most certainly did. Unlike the IEP in Doe, Tara's contained a statement of present educational level and objective standards for measuring performance. Moreover, the school board officials and her parents had not only her most recent grades but also a recent evaluation of her language skills. Thus, EAHCA were met even though the IEP could have been written with greater detail. 19