As a retired associate professor of special education from the University of Maine at Farmington, where I taught special education law from 2006-2017, I feel duty-bound to point out an error in the opening sentence of your Jan. 23 editorial, “Autism center would fill treatment void.” The editorial states, “Children with autism are eligible for special education services as long as they stay in school.”

That is an incorrect statement. It is possible to have autism and not be eligible for special education services. It is possible to have any of the 13 disabilities defined in the federal law that governs special education — The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) — and not be eligible for services under that law.

The IDEA clearly establishes eligibility for special education as a two-prong test: 1) The child must have at least one of the 13 defined disabilities; and 2) The child must therefore need special education services.

While it is quite possible that someone with autism may need special education services in school, it is not a given, either practically or legally. There are students with autism and other disabilities under the IDEA across this country who function successfully in school without special education services because the school supports that they need, if any, are available within the general education program.

The law’s eligibility requirements reflect the reality that all disabilities exist on a spectrum and, as a result, they affect one’s functioning to varying degrees. The eligibility requirements also reflect a fundamental principle in special education: needs determine services; labels do not. Otherwise, all students with a particular disability could be provided identical services, and that would deny them the individualized education programming required under the IDEA.

 

Dr. Rick Dale

Augusta

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