IEP Meeting Facilitation Strategies for Meaningful Inclusion of Students With Disabilities

Many educators are familiar with the phrase “all means all”: a cornerstone belief of inclusive education that no students should be exempt from accessing an inclusive education (Shogren et al., 2015). Special education law requires special education teachers and interprofessional teams to develop IEPs for students with disabilities that ensure students receive their education in the least restrictive environment (LRE; Individuals with Disabilities Education Act [IDEA], 2004). This means that students with disabilities should attend their general education classrooms alongside same grade-level peers. This law also means that students should only be removed from the inclusive environment if they are not making adequate progress and necessary services are unavailable in the general education setting. Despite well-established research on the benefits of inclusion for students with high support needs (e.g., intellectual and developmental disability [IDD] and behavioral disabilities), there are historical and current barriers to inclusive placements (Agran et al., 2020; Wehmeyer et al., 2021). The development of inclusive frameworks, such as the Universal Design for Learning (UDL), provides a range of practices that aim to design instruction and educational environments in a way that proactively builds a variety of supports and flexible options for engagement so that students with and without disabilities have fewer barriers to success and access (Levey, 2023; Lowrey et al., 2017). Although these strategies are becoming more well known, educators may face barriers to implementing some of these approaches for the first time.