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DoDEA School Health Services Manual 2942.0 Volume 1 Revised: 2016 DRAFT
C-10 Laws Relating to Children with Disabilities
A. Special Education
The DoD and its schools have a legal responsibility under IDEA to ensure that
children with disabilities have the opportunity to receive a free appropriate public
education, just like other children. School nurses play an important role in fulfilling this
legal responsibility by assisting in identification, assessment and accommodation of
students with special needs.
Each school must make an affirmative effort to identify children who may be
eligible for special education under IDEA through a process called “Child Find.” The
school nurse may assist with the Child Find process by conducting a health assessment.
Should the health assessment reveal that further medical evaluation is necessary; the
school nurse may need to coordinate with the local appropriate medical facility for
diagnostic evaluation and treatment.
The school nurse may also assist the multidisciplinary Case Study Committee
(CSC) in assessing or evaluating students suspected of or identified with special needs.
Students may be evaluated for disabilities, including intellectual/neuro developmental
disorder, cognitive deficit, hearing impairment, speech or language impairments, visual
impairments, emotional impairment, orthopedic impairments, autism, traumatic brain
injury and other health impairments or specific learning disabilities.
The school nurse may also assist the CSC in determining whether related
services, such as nursing services, counseling, speech therapy, physical therapy and
school health services are needed to accommodate or provide specialized services to an
eligible student.
In supporting certain accommodations, the school nurse may also need to train
unlicensed assistive personnel (UAP) in providing limited health-related services (e.g.,
routine medication administration, epinephrine administration, and asthma or diabetes
monitoring). See Section F: F-8, The School Nurse’s Role: Children with Disabilities, for
more information about the nurse’s role on the CSC.
B. Accommodation of Other Disabilities
The Child Find obligations under IDEA identify children who are ultimately
determined to be ineligible for special education but may qualify for accommodations
under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. The duty to provide an accommodation,
often known as “Section 504,” is derived from the nondiscriminatory purpose of the
law. The duty to accommodate means that any student who is a qualified person with
a disability may request an accommodation that will enable student access to a public