Failure ARD/IEP Meetings

Overview

Purpose: The purpose of a failure ARD is to address and explore the reasons for a student’s lack of adequate progress or failure in any scheduled class. 


Legal Requirements: While the law does not require an ARD/IEP meeting when a student fails a course, Spring Independent School District recommends as best practice that an ARD/IEP meeting be convened should a student fail his or her courses.



What We Do

Type of ARD: This should be held as a Revision ARD or as part of a student’s annual ARD meeting.  When addressing failures, this should not be an amendment as the student’s general education teacher of record for the course failed, the student’s case manager, the administrator and parent should all be involved in determining the reason(s) for the failure of the course(s) and what, if any, changes should be made to the student’s IEP.


Frequency: 

If a student continues to not make adequate progress for a second reporting period (9 weeks elementary and 6 weeks secondary), the case manager should again call a staffing with the teachers of the affected content areas to discuss components of the student’s IEP that are not effective or sociological factors that are hindering student progress, this will be recorded on the Special Education Progress Monitoring and Failure Documentation form


When a student fails at 9 weeks, regardless of the subject(s) in secondary or after 13 ½ weeks for elementary, the ARD committee should come together to address possible failure in an ARD.  


Things to Consider: 

  • Review current progress monitoring data (3 weeks data from course performance review & data gathered that is specific to IEP goals/objectives.) , IEP progress reports, service logs for implementation of accommodations/modifications and supporting documents 

  • Does the student have goals and objectives for the content area in which they failed?

  • Are the student’s goals and objectives appropriate?

  • Review of Special Education Progress Monitoring and Failure Documentation form  for progress monitoring data 

  • Review of the parent communication logs regarding student progress

  • Does the student have access to instructional materials, (e.g. technology, hot spot, etc.) 

  • Are the student’s classroom accommodations appropriate?  Are additional accommodations necessary?

  • Does the student receive support in the area in which they failed?  Is the support sufficient or should additional supports be implemented?

  • Is the student completing classwork and/or homework?

  • Is the student attending the class regularly or is absenteeism an issue?

The ARD committee is to document the considerations and responses that are applicable to the student in the ARD deliberations.


End of Year Retention: If a student is being recommended for retention, an ARD committee must convene to review the recommendation(s) for retention in a specific grade.  The Committee will consider the recommendation for retention and review the following pieces of data:

  • Grades

  • Attendance (Credit Recovery)

  • Behavior

  • Parent meetings/conferences (Parent Contact Log)

  • Effectiveness of Accommodations

  • Interventions

  • IEP/Services and Supports Log

  • IEP Goals and Objectives

  • Previous ARDs with Failure Documentation

Forms

Additional Resources