Parents' legal rights have enabled them to become involved in decisions that affect their child and request changes if needed. According to the website of the New Jersey Department of Education, "Parents have the right to attend meetings regarding identification (decision to evaluate), evaluation (nature and scope of assessment procedures), classification (determination of whether your child is eligible for special education and related services), development and review of your child's individualized education program (IEP), educational placement of your child and re-evaluation of your child."
The New Jersey Administrative Code for Special Education (N.J.A.C. 6A:14) consists of regulations that provide parents the right to participate in their children's education. Parents have direct input into their children's schooling and can choose settings that they feel are appropriate.
New Jersey parents enjoy the rights to give consent to evaluations and assessments, ask for changes in evaluation, attend IEP meetings, request changes to their child's records, and place children in private facilities if public education is not sufficient. Parents are responsible for payment to private schools, unless they can prove in a due-process hearing that their public-school district did not provide an appropriate education and the private school they have chosen does, according to the New Jersey Department of Education.
Parents are often given information on their rights; however, these documents are often hard to understand. The website familylight.com states that "school districts usually try to meet the letter of the law in making such documents available, but in all too many cases, really don't want parents to understand their rights, for fear that if parents really understood these laws, the school districts would be unable to afford the cost of providing the services the parents would find their children are entitled to receive." Parents need to make sure they are fully aware of their rights in New Jersey.
According to the website familylight.com, "These parental rights laws have unquestionably improved educational opportunities for many of the children who are the intended beneficiaries." Special-education services are now widely available so that children with special needs have access to an appropriate education in as unrestricted an environment as possible.
Inclusive classrooms that integrate students with disabilities into regular classes with modifications is an increasing trend. However, special-education students and parents may have to deal with misconceptions from regular teachers and students who believe that these children will automatically show problem behaviors or cannot learn from the classroom materials available. According to the education reform organization New Horizons for Learning, "Lowered academic expectations accompanied the "stigma" of one being in need of remediation and lowered self-perceptions among the labeled students usually resulted in a rise of behavioral and disciplinary issues."