A Big-Picture View of Special Education Litigation with Tim Adams

Inclusive Education Project (IEP) Podcast

Welcome! Today’s episode takes a big-picture view of what’s going on in education with our taxpayer dollars and how we can educate more parents about their general rights in advocating for their children. We use a recent California case as an example of how things can go so wrong–and cost millions of dollars–in special education law.

Tim Adams has been in law practice for over 23 years after working as a lay advocate in the special education legal clinic at the Pepperdine Law School. As president and CEO of the disability rights law firm Adams & Associates, Tim has worked with numerous families to help them advocate for their children and has firsthand experience in this role because of his younger brother with special needs. He sees his career as a special education attorney as a unique opportunity to help and support families.

Show Highlights:

• Tim’s recent high-profile case: Irvine Unified School District V. Landers and Gagliano
• The money side of this case (what the school district spent on litigation—over $1.1 million)
• The point of the recent Wall Street Journal article highlighting this case
• The facts: what parents and their attorneys are asking for in intervention and services is a drop in the bucket compared to what is spent in litigation
• Tim’s perspective on how often school districts are appealing court decisions
• Why this case has been a “win at all costs” endeavor for the school district
• Digging deeper into the argument that this case was a pushback attempt at anything jeopardizing the school district’s control, such as school choice, privatization, charter schools, etc.
• Tim’s decision-making process on which cases to appeal
• Why there will be many COVID cases in litigation for years to come
• The toll that a litigation process takes on families

Links/Resources:

Connect with Tim Adams: Website, LinkedIn, and Facebook

Contact us on social media or through our website for more information on the IEP Learning Center: www.inclusiveeducationproject.org

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