Mother's long fight to get special ed services for her son in Newington Public Schools

Nearly 90,000 students across our state are in special education and for some parents, getting their children into those programs can be daunting. For a Newington mother, it’s been a frustrating process with no clear resolution.

For Lai Ping Wong Coppinger, making sure her son succeeded in school was her top priority.

“He was already doing third grade math in second grade and his reading was off the charts. It was just his vocabulary was behind,” she said.

In documents provided with permission by Coppinger, her son was diagnosed with autism by doctors at Connecticut Children’s in 2010.   Because of this, he was placed into special education in East Hartford Public Schools and was given services through an individualized education program or IEP.

He eventually moved to the Newington school district as it was the Coppinger’s home district. His IEP was kept initially entering third grade. But during an evaluation conducted by a Newington school psychologist, they determined her son did not meet the criteria for autism and he was removed from his IEP.

This came despite Connecticut Children's reevaluating the son’s autism diagnosis and still determining he met the criteria for autism. The differing conclusions didn’t sit well with Coppinger.

“It was very frustrating. We spent months trying to get him caught up everywhere,” she said.

She says this began a lengthy process to get her son back into special education. During that time, she says her son struggled with time management.

“He’d come home, and he would do homework for 15 hours like all night. He would stay up until midnight almost every night, trying to get homework done,” Coppinger said.

Helen Taylor, founder of The Social Chase, a nonprofit that advocates for parents of students with disabilities, says the differing conclusions aren’t surprising to her. In an informal poll she conducted of 61 parents,14 parents said their school did not accept their physician’s autism with 13 other parents saying they had trouble getting their school to provide an IEP.

“They’re looking at it sometimes the other way that ‘Well, we don’t agree with it because our psychologist said this,” she said.

She believes this is happening because schools may be comparing students with disabilities to their peers rather than treating their circumstances as unique.

“That to me is a disservice,” Taylor said.

Coppinger says as she tried to get her son back on an IEP. She was able to get him on a 504 plan in 8th grade, which allowed for in-class accommodations, but not individual instruction or services. She felt it wasn’t enough.

“The social and emotional learning, that is the part my son really needed help with, and nobody bothered to take the time,” she said.

To build her case, she began compiling documents and found what she says are mistakes in the Newington school district’s record keeping. In one document, the school district told the state Department of Education, her son was on an IEP in the 2019-2020 school year, despite being removed a few years before. Another document mixed up who the parents were.

“I wish I knew I caught it sooner. I wish I knew what I knew now,” Coppinger said.

We reached to Newington Public Schools to ask about Coppinger’s situation. The district said in a statement it could not comment on individual students citing federal privacy laws. They did say they take their responsibilities to provide special education services seriously saying in part: “…if a student is eligible because they meet the qualifications of one of the categories of eligibility under the law and they require specialized instruction in order to make educational progress, we provide special education and related services.”

Taylor says parents should keep detailed records and should give direction to their school on a plan during any special education meeting.

“You can tell them what the goals and objectives are for your child because you know your child best. You know what they need,” she said.

Coppinger filed an administrative court case against the Newington school district, but the hearing officer ruled in favor of the school district saying her son, who has since graduated high school and now is attending college, was still able to succeed academically in school and that they had no jurisdiction to enforce a state law keeping all required special education records according with state and federal law. Coppinger says she still has a federal civil complaint with the Department of Education pending.

“It’s literally hard. I met a lot of parents who are going through the same thing, and they all said don’t quit,” she said.

Coppinger’s case now has the attention of some state lawmakers. They are discussing a legislative fix on school record keeping, which was raised as an issue during the hearing.