Free Appropriate Public Education

FAPE — Free Appropriate Public Education — is the cornerstone of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). It guarantees that every eligible child with a disability receives special education and related services specifically designed to meet their unique needs, at no cost to the family, in conformity with an IEP.

The key word is appropriate. School districts routinely offer the minimum they can justify. Our job is to hold them to the legal standard: an education genuinely tailored to your child's individual needs, not a one-size-fits-all program.

• Services are reduced or eliminated to save money
• Your child is regressing or making no meaningful progress
• The district offers a program based on availability, not appropriateness
• Related services (speech, OT, PT, counseling) are denied or under-provided
• Extended school year (ESY) services are refused without proper evaluation
• Your child's IEP goals have not changed in years despite lack of progress

When a school district has denied FAPE, your child may be entitled to compensatory education — additional services to make up for the time they were deprived of an appropriate education. Attorney Sparks has successfully secured compensatory ABA therapy, tutoring, and other services for families throughout California.