How to Request an IEE: Getting an Independent Educational Evaluation at Public Expense

The school conducted a Functional Behavioral Assessment and the report is one page. The behavioral description is vague. There's no direct observation data. The BIP they created based on it is a punishment list.

You believe the assessment is inadequate. You're right to question it. And under IDEA, you have the right to request an Independent Educational Evaluation — at the school's expense.

What an Independent Educational Evaluation Is

An Independent Educational Evaluation (IEE) is an educational evaluation conducted by a qualified examiner who is not employed by the school district. Under IDEA §300.502, parents have the right to request an IEE at public expense when they disagree with an evaluation — including a Functional Behavioral Assessment — conducted by the school.

"At public expense" means the school pays. Not you.

The IEE may be conducted in any area that the school evaluated — or that should have been evaluated. If the school conducted an FBA that you believe was inadequate, an IEE can include a new FBA by a private Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA). If the school's psychological evaluation didn't adequately assess behavioral functioning, an IEE can include a comprehensive neuropsychological evaluation.

When You Have the Right to an IEE

You have the right to request an IEE at public expense when you disagree with an evaluation the school conducted. The disagreement doesn't have to be about whether the school made a mistake — you simply need to disagree with the results or the methodology.

Common grounds for disagreement in behavioral situations:

• The FBA relied entirely on indirect assessments (interviews, rating scales) without any direct observation
• The behavioral definitions in the FBA were vague and unobservable
• The FBA failed to identify a clear behavioral function
• The FBA was conducted by an evaluator without specialized training in behavioral assessment
• The BIP strategies don't match the function identified in the FBA
• The assessment reached a conclusion inconsistent with your child's private clinical records

You do not need to explain or justify your disagreement in detail. Under the regulations, you can simply say you disagree with the school's evaluation and request an IEE at public expense.

How to Make the Request

The request must be in writing. Keep it simple. Email to the special education director is appropriate. The request might look like:

"I disagree with the [Functional Behavioral Assessment / psychological evaluation / educational evaluation] the school conducted on [date]. Under IDEA §300.502, I am requesting an Independent Educational Evaluation at public expense. Please provide me with information about the school's criteria for IEEs, including the qualifications required of the evaluator and the reasonable cost range."

That's it. You don't need to list every flaw you found in the school's evaluation. You don't need to threaten legal action. You simply state your disagreement and make the request.

What the School Must Do After You Request an IEE

After receiving your request, the school has two options:

Option 1: Fund the IEE

The school can agree to fund the IEE without initiating due process. They may provide you with a list of approved evaluators and a cost range. You are not required to use an evaluator from the school's list — IDEA specifies that the IEE evaluator must meet the school's qualification criteria, but the district cannot limit you to a specific approved provider list if qualified evaluators are available outside it.

Option 2: Request a Due Process Hearing

The school can challenge your right to an IEE by filing for due process and asking a hearing officer to determine whether their original evaluation was appropriate. If the hearing officer agrees with the school, you no longer have the right to an IEE at public expense (though you can still pay privately). If the hearing officer sides with you, the school must fund the IEE.

The school must make this choice — fund or file — promptly after your request. They cannot simply sit on the request for months.

Choosing an Evaluator for a Behavioral IEE

For an FBA-based IEE, you want an evaluator with specialized behavioral training. The gold standard is a Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) with experience conducting FBAs and developing BIPs for children in educational settings. BCBAs are certified by the Behavior Analyst Certification Board (BACB) and hold, at minimum, a master's degree with supervised clinical hours.

A BCBA conducting an IEE will:

• Conduct direct observation of your child across multiple settings (classroom, specials, transitions, lunch)
• Collect structured ABC data
• Administer indirect assessment tools like the Motivation Assessment Scale (MAS) or Questions About Behavioral Function (QABF)
• Interview parents, teachers, and relevant staff
• Write a report that identifies a clear behavioral hypothesis, critiques or confirms the school's hypothesis, and makes specific, function-matched intervention recommendations

A private, independent FBA conducted by a BCBA typically costs between $1,500 and $3,000. That's why the public-expense provision is so significant — most families cannot absorb that cost, and the IEE mechanism exists precisely because Congress recognized that parents need independent expertise to participate meaningfully in the IEP process.

Using the IEE Results at the IEP Meeting

The school must consider the IEE at an IEP team meeting. "Consider" means more than reading the report — it means the team must genuinely engage with the findings and explain, in writing, any recommendation they choose not to adopt.

If the IEE's FBA findings differ significantly from the school's — different hypothesized function, different recommended interventions — and the school rejects the IEE findings without adequate explanation, that rejection is grounds for a state complaint or due process hearing.

A private BCBA who conducted the IEE can attend the IEP meeting as your invited advocate. They can present their findings, explain their methodology, and answer questions from the team about the assessment and recommendations. This is one of the most effective uses of a BCBA — they speak the clinical language the school's team understands and can defend their findings with data.

IEE Rights in Other Jurisdictions

The public-expense IEE right is specific to IDEA in the United States. However, analogous rights exist elsewhere:

• UK: Parents can request an independent re-assessment as part of the EHCP process or through the SEND Tribunal. Legal aid may cover some costs.
• Australia: Parents can request independent assessments, though public funding is not automatically guaranteed. Some states have specific processes for challenging school assessments.
• Canada: Provincial human rights tribunals can order school boards to fund independent assessments as part of an accommodation remedy, though the specific procedures vary by province.

The Compensatory Education Connection

If an IEE reveals that the school's original FBA was so inadequate that your child received inappropriate behavioral support for a significant period — support that failed to address the actual function of their behavior — you may have grounds for a compensatory education claim. An independent BCBA can document the period of inadequate support and the skills or behavioral competencies your child failed to develop as a result.

The combination of a documented inadequate FBA and a private FBA showing what should have been done — and what was lost as a result of the delay — is powerful evidence for a compensatory education claim.

The Behavior Support & FBA/BIP Toolkit includes a guide to evaluating the technical adequacy of a school-conducted FBA — the exact questions to ask and the red flags to look for before deciding whether an IEE is warranted.