Opinion ID: 525199
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Appropriate Program

Text: 18 Mrs. Knight would still be entitled to reimbursement for Andy's tuition at The Lab School for the 1986-87 school year, under Burlington School Committee, if the District's proposed placement was not appropriate. Since DCPS discharges its duty under the Act if it merely places the student in a program sufficient to confer some educational benefit ..., Hendrick Hudson Dist. Bd. of Ed. v. Rowley, 458 U.S. 176, 200, 102 S.Ct. 3034, 3048, 73 L.Ed.2d 690 (1982), a court cannot order the District to reimburse Mrs. Knight unless it can say that Buchanan would not have met even that modest standard. In addressing that question, moreover, the reviewing court must give the administrative determination that Buchanan is appropriate due weight. Id. at 206, 102 S.Ct. at 3051. Mrs. Knight has fallen far short of meeting the burden that the Act has thus placed upon her. 19 We need not tarry long over this point, for Mrs. Knight has not contended that Buchanan would be unable to provide some educational benefit to Andy. Rather, each of her arguments is directed to the claimed superiority of The Lab School's program. For example, she does not argue that Andy needs a particular boy/girl ratio in order to realize some educational benefit, and that Buchanan does not provide it, but only that in order for Andy to cope with his gender identity disorder, the more equal the ratio the better. The mere statement of the claim shows its insufficiency as a basis upon which to overturn the hearing examiner. Thus, while there is no disputing that the ratio of boys to girls is more favorable in this regard at The Lab School than at Buchanan, and while it may well be that The Lab School would therefore be, in this regard, a superior educational environment for Andy, the Act does not permit us to make such a comparative inquiry, and Mrs. Knight has presented no evidence that would permit us to conclude that Buchanan's ratio of boys to girls is such that Andy could not progress educationally there. 20 Mrs. Knight also argues that the ideal situation would be for Andy's peers to have IQs similar to or higher than his. The testimony established that the ranges of IQs among the children at The Lab School (from 83 to 139) and at Buchanan (from 70 to 140) were almost identical. Within the group of students from which Andy's classmates would come, the range at Buchanan was from 82 to 118, with an average of 93 and a median of 91. No similar data were provided for The Lab School, however. Thus, there is no basis in the record for asserting that the intellectual mix of Andy's peers in the two programs would be significantly different. More important, however, there is simply no evidence to support the proposition that Andy will be unable to obtain educational benefits in Buchanan's environment, and the absence of such evidence is fatal to Mrs. Knight's argument over relative IQ ranges. 21 Finally, Mrs. Knight argues that Buchanan's location is inconvenient. Assuming it is so inconvenient that the point is relevant, DCPS did offer to accommodate the Knights' transportation needs, in light of which we cannot conclude that Buchanan is so inaccessible as to render it inappropriate. We do not hold that a placement can never be so geographically undesirable that its location alone makes it inappropriate, but this is not even a close case in that regard. 22 In short, while The Lab School may well be in some respects, and overall, a better place than is Buchanan for Andy, the Act simply does not place the comparative question before the court. It is thus clear that the district court erred in overturning on comparative grounds the hearing officer's non-comparative determination that Buchanan was an appropriate placement.