Child Find
Local educational agencies are required under Federal Regulation 34 CFR 300.220 to initiate an awareness campaign to locate, identify and evaluate children with disabilities who may need special education or related services. This campaign is known as “Child Find.” Parents, relatives, public and private agencies and concerned citizens can help school districts find any child, age birth through 21 years, who may have a disability and need special education or related services.
What does a disability mean?
For Birth to age 3 - An established condition known to result in delay, or a documented developmental delay.
For ages 3 through 5 - A documented deficit in one or more of the following developmental areas: communication, vision, hearing, motor skills, social emotional/behavioral functioning, self-help skills, and/or cognitive skills.
For ages 5 through 21 - Identification of one or more of the following conditions: autism, intellectual disability, deaf-blindness, hearing impaired, emotional disability, multiple disability, orthopedic impairment, other health impairment, specific learning disability, speech language impairment, traumatic brain injury, and/or visual impairment
Who can help?
Parents, relatives, public and private agency employees, and concerned citizens are used to help Norton City Schools find any child, age birth-21, who may have a disability and need special education and related services. If you are aware of a child who may have special needs, please notify Norton's Department of Student Services or the school principal.
What happens next?
Norton's Department of Student Services will contact the parents of the child to find out if the child needs to be evaluated. Free testing is available to families to determine whether or not a special need exists. Evaluation Team Reports (ETR) are coordinated by licensed School Psychologists and licensed Speech Language Pathologists (SLP). Evaluations follow the format set forth by the Ohio Department of Education, Office for Exceptional Children. These educational assessments are designed to assess the child’s current levels of performance in order to determine whether the child has a disability (as outlined above) which requires specialized instruction. If a need is identified, the child can begin receiving the appropriate special education and related services. A full continuum of programs and services are available to students with disabilities who attend the Norton City Schools. Children receive special education and related services in the school that houses their current grade-level unless the child’s needs can not be successfully and appropriately met in that school. In that situation the district reserves the right to provide services in another building in the district. Additionally, some programs are available through cooperative placements with neighboring school districts. All programs and services that are required to provide the child with a free and appropriate public education (FAPE) are provided at no cost to the family through an Individualized Education Program (IEP) specifically designed to meet the individual child's unique needs. The sooner we know about the unique and specialized needs of children, the better it goes for every child. If you know a child who may have special needs, help is available. Contact the following:
Norton City Schools
Department of Student Services
4128 Cleveland-Massillon Road, Norton, Ohio 44203
Phone (330) 706-2733
Click here to access the Child Find brochure for Norton City Schools.
Common Misconceptions and Additional Information
Medical or mental health diagnosis does not guarantee an educational evaluation or special education services.
Failure, low grades, lack of performance or behavioral concerns do not automatically indicate a suspected disability. Many factors contribute to a student’s performance.
Your student’s educational team reviews all available information to determine if additional steps are needed in the school setting.
In order for school districts to suspect a disability, a child’s educational functioning and performance must be adversely impacted.
A medical diagnosis does not automatically make a child eligible for special education services, nor does it automatically warrant an evaluation for special education services.
The Ohio Department of Education (ODE) requires that all students receive documented interventions for academic or behavioral needs through a Response to Intervention (RtI) process. Data generated from interventions are considered by the team to determine if an educational disability is suspected.
When an educational disability is suspected, the parent/legal guardian is the only person who is able to give written consent to begin an evaluation.
A School Team May Suspect an Educational Disability when:
A student is not progressing with social emotional or behavioral support/intervention.
A student’s health is adversely impacting their educational performance.
A student is not making academic progress despite being provided intensive research based interventions.
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