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D.C. Letter 16: The Tuition-Reimbursement Ledger

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When to Use It

Use this when you placed your child privately and want the cost back. It is the highest-value and highest-risk claim in the District's version of the packet, because one of its two burdens never moves in your favor: whether your private placement was appropriate stays yours to prove, start to finish, with no shift at any point. Whether the agency's program was appropriate is not carved out the same way: once you make your prima facie showing, that burden shifts to the agency, the same as it does on the shift-eligible claims on DC-Letter 11 (D.C. Code 38-2571.03(6)(A)(i)-(ii); DC-Tool 23; DC-Letter 11).

The underlying case still runs on the familiar federal framework: the agency's program was not appropriate, your private placement was appropriate, and the equities favor reimbursement (Burlington School Committee v. Department of Education, 471 U.S. 359 (1985); Florence County School District Four v. Carter, 510 U.S. 7 (1993)). D.C. adds a bifurcation risk this ledger has to carry on its face: a hearing officer may decide the appropriateness of the agency's program first, and if that program is found appropriate, may skip the private-placement inquiry entirely, closing the case before your placement is ever examined on the merits. Plan your proof so the agency's-program prong stands on its own strength, not on the assumption the officer will reach your placement at all.

Room and board belongs on this ledger by name. Where DCPS fails to offer an IEP by the start of the school year, without parental obstruction, that failure is a FAPE denial, and the reimbursement that follows can include room and board or boarding costs, not tuition alone (Leggett v. District of Columbia, 793 F.3d 59 (D.C. Cir. 2015)). If your placement is residential, do not leave those costs off the ledger on the assumption only tuition counts.

The 10-business-day notice rule has a trigger that is narrower than it sounds. It is not any recent IEP meeting; it is the most recent IEP Team meeting the parent attended before the removal. If your notice runs on the meeting route rather than the 10-day written-notice route, confirm the meeting you are pointing to was in fact the last one you attended before you removed the child, not merely a recent one (34 C.F.R. 300.148(d)(1)(i)-(ii), (e); checked August 13, 2026). And keep the certificate-of-approval distinction in view: a placement without a certificate of approval faces a steeper climb, requiring the hearing officer to find both that no public program and no certificate-of-approval nonpublic school can provide FAPE, before an award to a non-certified school is available at all (DC-Tool 33).

Use it with: DC-Tool 32 (tuition reimbursement) and DC-Tool 33 (prospective relief and the Branham factors).