Disciplining students with disabilities Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Disciplining students with disabilities - Essay Example ly, discipline makes students learn how to manage and control their own behavior, and lastly, discipline can also ensures an effective classroom climate that has positive impact on the students. Regardless of whether the students are disabled or not, disciplinary action is deemed necessary to ensure control and management of the students. All students have a right to be disciplined using the prescribed procedural and substantive areas of discipline. These rights are provided for under the 4th and 14th amendments of the US Constitution. Procedural procedure includes fairness of the disciplinary actions, while substantive process protects student rights from being violated by school officials and ensures that the discipline is reasonable, regardless of the student’s physical condition. Students with disabilities are protected from discriminatory disciplinary action under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act (1973). There are certain procedures that are to be followed to avoid such discrimination. First of all, the school administration has to use same procedures for disciplining both students with or without disabilities. Secondly, school officials have to conduct the manifestation determination in order to assess any relations between student disabilities and their misconduct, before applying any actions such as long-term suspension, expulsion or placement changes. Thirdly, school officials have to ensure the teachers are conversant with the provisions of the law (such as provisions of section 504), so as due procedures are followed during disciplinary action. There are three major pointers that underlie disciplinary changes of the 1997 IDEA and the 2004 IDEA. To begin with, the law categorically emphasizes on the adoption of positive behavioral interventions, support programs and provision of specialized services for students with disabilities. This ensures that such students are less likely to be punished. Secondly, school officials and teachers are expected