Endrew F. v. Douglas County School District (2017) FAPE and the U.S. Supreme Court

On March 22, 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court announced its decision in Endrew F. v. Douglas County School District. This case, coming 35 years after the Supreme Court’s first special education decision in Board of Education of the Hendrick Hudson Central School District v. Rowley (1982), addressed the question of how much educational benefit public schools are required to provide to students with disabilities eligible for special education under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) in order to confer a free appropriate public education (FAPE). In the unanimous opinion, the Supreme Court ruled that in developing student individualized education programs, school districts must aim to enable students to make academic and functional progress in light of their circumstances. In this article, we (a) examine the IDEA’s definition of FAPE; (b) review the Supreme Court’s first FAPE ruling in Board of Education v. Rowley; (c) consider the different post-Rowley FAPE standards developed in the U.S. Courts of Appeals; (d) explain the Supreme Court’s unanimous ruling in this case; and (e) discuss implications of this decision for special education.