Illinois · special-education accountability
Due-process decisions, decoded
What is a due-process hearing — and why would a parent need one?
When a parent and a school district can't resolve a disagreement about a child's special education — whether the IEP is appropriate, where the child is placed, or what services or evaluations are owed — either side can file for a due-process hearing: a formal, court-like proceeding before a neutral state hearing officer. It is the strongest enforcement tool a parent has under federal law (the IDEA), and usually a last resort after other steps fail. Below is every Illinois decision on record (316, FY 2008–2026) — read and classified so you can see what families actually fight over and how often they win.
Why this is statewide, not per-district. ISBE anonymizes both the district and the student in every decision ("Student … v. District"), so these can't be tied to a specific district — but as a body they show the system clearly. ISBE source
What these 293 decisions were about — and how they came out
We read every decision on file and classified each by the issue in dispute and who prevailed. (Some early decisions could not be machine-read.)
Who prevailed
35%Parent prevailed (104)18%Split decision (52)46%District prevailed (136)0%Dismissed / withdrawn (1)
Parents prevailed outright in about 35% of decided cases — a reminder that these hearings are hard-fought and far from a sure thing, which is why most disputes are resolved long before this stage.
Most common issues in dispute
FAPE denial245
IEP adequacy/implementation156
Placement/LRE156
Eligibility/evaluation/child find135
Compensatory education109
Private/residential placement & reimbursement103
Related services92
Independent educational evaluation (IEE)88
Procedural/parent-participation81
Behavior/discipline/manifestation66
Disabilities most often involved
Specific Learning Disability 57Autism 50Emotional Disability 39Other Health Impairment 33Intellectual Disability 20Speech/Language 8Hearing Impairment 4Developmental Delay 3
Parents of a first-grader with attention deficits and aggressive behaviors challenged his IEP services and his placement in a private therapeutic day school, preferring a self-contained classroom in a regular school, but the hearing officer found the IEP appropriate and the therapeutic day school the right setting and denied all relief.
FAPE denialIEP adequacy/implementationPlacement/LRE
Parents of a child with Down syndrome won a finding that the district denied a free appropriate education by failing to provide a communication device and cutting his speech minutes, earning reimbursement for the device and 32 hours of make-up speech therapy, but the hearing officer refused to reimburse their decision to home-school him.
FAPE denialIEP adequacy/implementationEligibility/evaluation/child find
A father whose custody order gave him only limited educational decision-making authority could only pursue procedural complaints about notice, records, and meeting participation when his child's placement was changed, and the hearing officer found no violation and denied his claims.
Procedural/parent-participation
A parent accused the district of deceiving them into a therapeutic-day-school placement and mishandling evaluations and behavior plans for a young child with autism and ADHD, but the hearing officer found only one minor procedural slip (a late evaluation) that did not deny a free appropriate education and ruled for the district.
FAPE denialPlacement/LREIEP adequacy/implementation
Parents of a three-year-old with a speech delay argued she should attend the district preschool five days a week instead of getting brief speech services in a therapist's office, but the hearing officer found the evaluation, IEP, and placement appropriate and denied all the parents' requests.
FAPE denialPlacement/LREEligibility/evaluation/child find
The district asked that its plan placing a young student in a therapeutic day school be found appropriate and that the parent be forced to consent to placement applications; the hearing officer agreed the placement was appropriate but ruled it had no authority to override the parent's refusal to consent.
FAPE denialPlacement/LREIEP adequacy/implementation
The district filed to defend its reevaluation of a high school student with a learning disability after the parent requested an outside evaluation; the parent largely did not participate, and the hearing officer found the district's evaluation appropriate and ruled it did not have to fund an independent one.
Independent educational evaluation (IEE)Eligibility/evaluation/child find
The district filed to defend its reevaluation of a student with autism and an intellectual disability after refusing the parent's request for an outside evaluation, and the hearing officer found the district's evaluation appropriate and ruled it did not have to pay for an independent evaluation or a separate behavior assessment.
Independent educational evaluation (IEE)Eligibility/evaluation/child find
Parents of a high schooler with health and attention conditions claimed the district mishandled her hearing-assistance device, gym accommodations, and math placement and caused her anxiety and lower grades, but the hearing officer found no denial of a free appropriate education and denied all the parents' claims.
FAPE denialIEP adequacy/implementation