Chris,
You have identified the MAIN problem with the Federal Law in the area of ED (SED or EBD in some states.) What I said is true (everything is lumped together so either behavior or emotional problems should qualify a student) but that does not make it workable. Mixing big time acters-out with kids with mood disorders does not work.
I have to add, however, that I lost at Due Process on this issue: I would not put ex-difficult child into classes with the same kids who had been his tormentors through grade school. The H.O. was extrememly biased, however, saying it was "inconvenient" that a student with so many intense emotional needs also needed German, advanced math and science, regular English, yada, yada, yada, that were not offered in "self-contained" programs where, apparently, not only were most of the kids acters-out, they also were concommitant for LDs. She found ex-difficult child difficult to fit into her OSFA approach and she just ignored the issues you raise as real problems in obtaining FAPE.
This was a HUGE contributing factor to ex-difficult child landing in EGBS--which was carefully selected NOT to contain highly acting out students, had a ZERO tolence for violence, was therapeutic rather than exclusively b-mod, and had many students with mood disorders etc. So through private pay, you can control who the other students are. Our high school district deprived ex-difficult child of FAPE, and there was nothing I could do about it after the H.O. found the behavior of the "other students" to be irrelevant to FAPE. We could not pay for EGBS and go to court. I made the correct decision for our family, I think.
Fortunately, after EGBS, no Special Education was needed and although I kept ex-difficult child registered with the SD as "non-attending" as the ultimate backstop legally should he crash. I never signed an IEP after the 8th grade IEP and he has never been back in the h.s. building that I know of after EGBS--never mind attending.
Martie
