When you disagree
Find the right route: informal, mediation, complaint or hearing
What is happening?
Tick everything that applies. Most real situations hit several of these at once, which is exactly why a single yes-or-no flowchart gives the wrong answer.
All four routes, side by side
Worth reading even if the tool above picked one for you — families are usually offered only whichever route the district mentions.
| Route | Who decides | Cost | How long | Time limit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Put it in writing and reconvene | The IEP team, with you on it | Nothing | Days to a few weeks | Any time |
| Mediation | You and the district — nobody can impose an outcome | Free; the state pays the mediator | Weeks | Any time — it does not require a due process complaint first |
| State complaint | Your state education agency | Free; no lawyer needed | 60 calendar days, by regulation | The violation must have happened within the past year |
| Due process hearing | An impartial hearing officer | You may represent yourself, but most families who prevail have a lawyer. Fees may be recoverable if you win. | 75 days at a minimum by regulation, and commonly far longer with extensions | Generally two years from when you knew or should have known about the problem |
| Complaint to the Office for Civil Rights | The Office for Civil Rights | Free | Months, and often longer | Generally 180 days from the discriminatory act |
Get free help before you file
Your state’s parent center
Free, federally funded, and staffed largely by parents who have been through this. They will read your IEP with you at no charge.
CADRE — state dispute resolution contacts
The national centre on special education dispute resolution. Use it to find the office in your state that takes complaints and arranges mediation.
Your state’s special education regulations
The official directory of state education agency special education directors, kept by the US Department of Education.
Nothing you type here is sent anywhere. This page has no server to send it to.
This is information about what the regulations say, not legal advice, and it is not a substitute for someone who knows your child. Special education law also varies by state. Your state parent center is free, federally funded, and will go through any of this with you.
The route nobody offers you
When a family says the school is not doing what the IEP says, the answer they usually get is "you can always file for due process". Due process is the slowest, most expensive and most adversarial of the four routes, and for that particular problem it is close to the worst fit.
A state complaint is free, needs no lawyer, must be resolved in sixty days by regulation, and is built precisely for provable failures: services not delivered, deadlines missed, meetings held without you. It is also by far the least used.
Matching the route to the problem
- Can you prove it with documents? State complaint.
- Do you disagree about what your child needs? Mediation, or due process if you need a decision rather than a compromise.
- Is this about discrimination or retaliation? The Office for Civil Rights.
- Has it only happened once? Put it in writing first. Most things resolve there, and everything else depends on the record you build now.
Time limits are shorter than people expect
A state complaint must concern something that happened in the past year. A civil rights complaint generally has a 180-day window. Due process is generally two years. If you are near any of those edges, that fact alone may decide the route for you.