Court Opinion

ID: 9469912
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 02:52:01.108625+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:41:37.692525
License: Public Domain

LEVIN H. CAMPBELL,
Circuit Judge (concurring).
Two aspects of the opinion below give me concern, especially in the wake of Board of Education v. Rowley, - U.S. -, 102 S.Ct. 3034, 73 L.Ed.2d 690 (1982).
1. The district court’s phraseology indicating that it would grant “no special deference” to the state proceeding. The thrust of this is hard to square with the Rowley “due weight” standard. Id. at -, 102 S.Ct. at 3050.
2. The district court’s reference to the child’s “important personal needs,” which seems to look beyond the Act’s requirement of an “appropriate education.” 20 U.S.C. § 1412(1).
Yet I believe that the district court reached an acceptable result here and did so even though the standards were not properly articulated. As for the first problem, this matter boils down to a dispute over *814John’s individual educational needs. This was a proper matter for the court to decide on the conflicting evidence before it. No issue of broad educational policy is involved. Massachusetts state law clearly provides for residential placements where warranted. See Mass.Admin.Code tit. 603, § 502.6 (1979). Unlike the situation in Rowley, the court did not reject a state I.E.P. that would have clearly permitted the child to achieve significant educational benefit. Rather the court supportably accepted expert testimony indicating that the child risked retrogression under the state’s proposed I.E.P., which involved moving him from a setting of proven value to an entirely new, untested one.
As for the court’s reference to “important personal needs,” I think in this context that the needs the court actually had in mind can fairly be considered educational. It plainly feared that in a non-residential setting, John would not be able to learn.
Accordingly I agree that the district court’s findings should be affirmed.