A Neurodiversity-Affirming Approach to the IEP Process
Lisa Baskin-Wright is a former educator and current IEP coach who navigates the IEP experience through a strength-based and neurodiversity affirming approach. Lisa uses her platform to support families in the IEP process, provide parents with affirming providers and resources, and spread this message.
Today’s conversation with Lisa suggests a much-needed shift in perspective for parents and educators - but most importantly for learners.
What is an IEP?
If you’re unfamiliar with the acronym IEP, IEP stands for individualized education plan. It describes the plan for the student's educational program, including current performance levels, goals that are reasonable for the student to achieve within that year, and the educational placement and other services the student will receive.
Traditionally, IEPs have led with a medical model or deficit-based model for most of our educational experience. Now, there is this positive shift to getting curious about the child in front of us and how to support those strengths in the classroom.
What does a neurodiversity-affirming IEP process look like?
Every human has equal value and worth. When we look through the lens of deficit or deficient, it's like something's broken and we're going to try to fix it. Being neurodivergent or disabled doesn't mean you're broken.
When we approach the IEP process with a neurodiversity affirming lens we can honor them in their full humanity. This means getting curious, seeking to understand how the child engages in their world, how they communicate, how they think, and meeting them where they are at.
Writing a neurodiversity affirming IEP starts with recognizing that your child is fully human, that this is their neurotype, that we’re not here to fix them and that being neurodivergent is both fantastic and hard.
Being a neurodivergent human in a world that wasn't designed to embrace difference is not easy. So shifting the lens to point out their strengths and to hear the greatness within your child might feel foreign in our neuronormative culture.
And while this doesn’t solve everybody's problems, it does help families reframe how they're thinking about their learners. It informs how they parent, which battles they pick at the IEP table, and it informs how they engage in that relationship with the team.
“One of the best things that can happen at an IEP table is when everyone leaves their ego at the door and gets truly curious about the learner.
No one claims to be right, no one diminishes another’s perspective, and everyone is trying to consider the child and their point of view and experience in the classroom.
It doesn’t always happen, but when it does, it’s incredibly powerful, and the possibilities for the learner are endless.”
Parent input statements and advocacy during the IEP process
Lisa recommends starting with a parent input statement as it is the foundation of your IEP. It doesn't matter where you are in the country, it might be called something different, but there is always a section in an IEP where they're capturing the strengths of the student and parental feedback.
The 4 things we can advocate for every neurodivergent learner:
The four things Lisa always advocates for in her client’s parent input statements are: autonomy, agency, self-advocacy, and regulation.
More specifically, the parent input statement is used to capture who this learner is- What's their temperament? What kinds of things do they enjoy? What are things about them that the school team may not know? It then describes an overarching theme of what you’re hoping for, for your learner.
How to prepare for an IEP meeting
To set the tone ahead of time and solidify the focus of this meeting on honoring your child, Lisa recommends you round out your parent input statement with a vision statement and submit it to the team at least a week ahead of time. This tells the team: this is where I need your attention focused, this is how we are framing my child and I expect when I come into this space that you're holding this information paramount.
It allows you to be a guide in this situation, like a North Star, showing this is where we are going. And it reshapes how the learner views themself too.
IEP process: federal regulations for parents
As a parent you have the right to equal participation in the IEP process. This is federally protected. Some districts are better than others and will ask for your input ahead of time and even provide you with the data they have. However, if this is not the case and you don't have access to the same information as everybody else, then you can't meaningfully participate come meeting time.
In this situation, Lisa suggests: let's pretend it's a Friday. You haven't gotten any information and your meeting is Monday morning. Send out an email on Friday afternoon saying-
“Thank you so much for taking the time to meet with us on Monday morning. Really looking forward to having a collaborative conversation to discuss our child's program. Because we don't have access to the same information as the rest of the team this is most likely going to just be an information gathering conversation and we very well may need to have a part two where we can actually make decisions.”
You can even send this email weeks prior to the meeting saying:
“If we are unable to get draft copies of your reports or a draft copy of the IEP by the Friday before our Monday meeting, then we’ll need time to make our decisions.”
Sometimes that lights a fire under them because they don't have time to do a part two.
In other situations they might say, “Sorry we just don't do that here.” And you can respond saying: “No problem, we're probably not going to feel comfortable making decisions during the space of the meeting. We're going to need some time to review everything.”
Different states have different regulations around this. For example, here in California, IEPs don't go into effect until they're signed. But there are a whole lot of states in the union where that's not the case. There's a window of time that could be 10 days. 14 days. Where if you don't file for due process, you don't file the complaint to start the paperwork, that IEP is going into effect in that timeframe.
The dance varies depending on where you live, but the strategy of: “We can't make any decisions if I don't have equal access to information” always applies.
Where to start in an IEP meeting
The IEP process typically starts reviewing data and writing focus goals for the year. But by just looking at data, you are going to hit resistance during those meetings every single time. While you need baselines and present levels of the child to set reasonable goals, Lisa suggests starting with connection to the team.
“Modeling that we can be lifelong learners gives the team permission to realize they don’t have to be perfect and have it all figured out either. We don’t have to live in the binary. We can be in the middle.”
In a traditional IEP process, you as the parent are having to be really exposed and vulnerable. You're having to share all of this information about your child, about yourself, family history, your decisions as parents. It's very, very exposing with people you don't necessarily trust.
So it's kind of against intuition to say, the more you expose, the more you give the team permission, but it's sort of how you do it, right? It's nuanced.
And so, some of the guidance Lisa gives parents is: it's okay to say to a team, I'm learning too.
Modeling what you want from them. Modeling this journey of: Gosh, in hindsight, I cringe at some of the decisions I made when I didn't have the information I have now. But now that I have this information, it's really important that I'm sharing my personal transformation as a parent and how that's made an impact in our home. Giving you permission to reframe your decisions too.
And this focus on building positive relationships as a team means we might have conflict too. There is dissent in a positive healthy relationship. Building that relationship at the beginning allows us to say to one another in the future: “Gosh, I don't think we're seeing eye to eye on this. Can we talk it through?”
It's that vulnerability piece that allows for connection, which applies to everyone at the IEP table including the child in the classroom. It extends to them feeling safe enough to self-advocate and share what's going on.
When we are asking students to learn, whether they're neurodivergent or not, we're asking them to be incredibly vulnerable too. Because doing something you don't know how to do yet is very exposing. So we are much more willing as humans to try and expose ourselves in ways that make us vulnerable if we feel safe and connected to whoever that adult is that's in the room.
When we focus on creating a program that opens the doors for the adults to really engage with this learner in ways that are meaningful- those relationships can blossom. And that feels like a win and a success for the team which they want more of.
So there's a bit of a leap of faith at the start of the meeting because setting the tone that we're all here to learn is vulnerable. But it also reminds the team that you bring value, expertise and perspective that is necessary to create a meaningful program for your child. When we enter a space presuming the competence of the team and honoring their perspective, there's more willingness to shift. That's part of the shift in the dialogue.
Writing neurodiversity-affirming IEP goals
Taking a neurodiversity-affirming perspective in the IEP process allows for more peace and better communication amongst the team. The next step in this process is writing focus goals that detail what is needed for your child to develop the skill or behavior you’re working towards.
Lisa is very passionate about this topic and started off with an example of her least favorite focus goal: the child will transition from a preferred activity to a non-preferred activity without displaying problematic or protest behaviors.
Focus goals are best written around teaching the learner new skills. The problem with the way this focus goal is written is that it’s not about that. That goal is about compliance, and compliance-based goals lead to so many poor outcomes.
Compliance goal setting (and the major problem with it)
Compliance-based goals lead to masking (for learners that can comply- especially if they’re the “rules are gospel” type kids.) These types of goals increase anxiety and decrease their ability to be able to learn because they're so hyper-focused on doing it right and not getting in trouble. So by creating compliance-based goals, the experience for that type of temperament is heated, taxing, and going to push that kid into burnout.
Another concerning factor is autistic learners who can be more literal in their interpretation of things. So, if we set this rule that you're always supposed to do XYZ or you're always supposed to listen to me, we're setting the stage for them to not listen to their intuition, and we're creating a scenario where potentially we're making them less safe.
“Blind compliance contradicts the advocacy goal of autonomy and agency, which we want these kids to develop.”
We want all people to develop a sense of themselves, a sense of their voice, and however, they communicate, to be able to be in a situation and think “I don't know that this is for me,” and have the tools to exit or be able to trust themselves.
The problem is that a lot of our systems are compliance-driven, so it's not binary. We need to be a bit more nuanced and we need to be asking ourselves, what skills are we actually trying to teach?
If we go back to the focus goal of ‘you're going to transition throughout your day without having a problem’ - the skill is transition.
In this example we ask:
How do we rewrite that goal to support what this learner may need to be able to transition?
How can we teach that particular skill without teaching them to self-abandon and mask to conform to neurotypical expectations?
Rebuilding focus goals for student success in a neurodiversity-affirming IEP process
To rewrite the goal, Lisa suggests naming factors like:
What kinds of sensory support they need
What kinds of executive functioning differences might they have
Pre-planning or pre-negotiating with the learner (depending on their age and developmental readiness)
For example, providing a model of the exact finished product so they have a template to know what “done” looks like in a task.
Building wait time into an accommodation to support processing and motor planning differences
The child may have understood what you said, but it takes an extra beat for them to get their body to respond.
If we are building choice into goals, even the choice to dissent, we are providing scaffolding. If we are providing a model, or we are providing a visual, or we are allowing for movement - the likelihood is they will be able to flow through their day more seamlessly because we're meeting their needs and honoring who they are and not trying to control them.
IEP process: goal ideas for neurodivergent learners
Unsure which goals to mention at your meeting? Lisa shared her go-to ideas for supporting your neurodivergent child in the classroom:
Unrestricted access to sensory support. A shift from this idea that sensory support doesn’t need to be earned
Providing access to robust communication. A shift from this idea that spoken language is superior
Unrestricted access to what’s equitable for all
Allowing for movement and alternative ways to engage. Shifting from a learner sitting in their spot or at the table to alternative ways of engaging and recognizing that it's okay to stand and move a little bit
Providing choice and respecting autonomy. Moving away from declarative language and not engaging in a power struggle over nothing
Ultimately, creating a neurodiversity affirming IEP means:
“We need to move away from fear and trying to control. We need to move towards curiosity, recognizing the inherent value in all humans, and always presuming competence. We try too hard to control and change, and I think that's born out of fear of difference. We need to move away from fear and just celebrate differences, recognize value, and be curious.”
More Resources Mentioned in the Episode
Connect with Lisa! She’s @lisabaskinwright on Instagram, where you can find the parent resources, templates, and examples of parent input statements.
Here are the must-have free resources Lisa mentioned from her website: her All About Me worksheet as well as her Neurodiversity-Affirming Resource List.
And here’s the shareable pamphlet I mentioned at the end of the episode for creating equitable learning environments for all students.
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Still curious about anything we mentioned today? I'd love to hear what's on your mind.
It's really a dream come true to have a platform to discuss these issues that are so near and dear to my heart with you. And I'm just so grateful that you're here with me today and ready to support each other on our journeys.
