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Tool 59: Restraint and Seclusion: What to Ask for, in Writing, the Same Day

This complete tool is free to every family. It is 1 of 5 permanently free tools from The IEP Field Manual.

THE RULE

This tool has to begin by taking something away from you, because you are entitled to know it before you make a plan.

There is no comprehensive federal law governing restraint and seclusion in public schools. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) does not define restraint or seclusion. Its regulations, 34 C.F.R. Part 300, do not set rules for when either may be used, do not require an incident report, and do not set a deadline for telling you what happened to your child. If someone tells you that federal law entitles you to a written report within 24 hours, that is not correct as a matter of federal special education law, and believing it can cost you a week.

Here is what actually governs.

State law and district policy do most of the work. They may define restraint and seclusion, limit their use, require training, and establish parent-notice or written-report deadlines. Verify the current rule where the child attends school before asserting a deadline. Federal Section 504 and Title II protections apply independently.

The U.S. Department of Education has issued guidance, and guidance is not law. The Department’s Restraint and Seclusion: Resource Document (May 2012) sets out 15 principles, including that restraint and seclusion should never be used except when a child’s behavior poses imminent danger of serious physical harm, and should never be used as punishment or discipline. That document says on its face that whether to implement its principles is for state and local officials to decide. It is worth quoting to a school board. It does not create a right you can enforce.

Federal civil rights law does apply. In a 2016 guidance letter, OCR identified three potential Section 504 violations: unnecessary different treatment of students with disabilities, a policy or practice with a discriminatory effect, or denial of FAPE. The letter remains hosted, but OCR’s current restraint-and-seclusion page does not list it as current policy guidance. Use the current Section 504 regulations and fact-specific enforcement materials for present-tense legal claims. An OCR complaint generally must be filed within 180 calendar days, subject to limited waivers.

And the IDEA reaches this ground sideways, through the IEP. If your child’s behavior impedes his learning or that of others, the team must consider positive behavioral interventions and supports (34 C.F.R. § 300.324(a)(2)(i)). The team must revise the IEP to address any lack of expected progress (34 C.F.R. § 300.324(b)(1)(ii)(A)). And you have the right to inspect and review every education record the school keeps on your child (34 C.F.R. § 300.613; FERPA, 20 U.S.C. § 1232g; 34 C.F.R. § 99.10), which is how you get the incident report the same week even where no state rule commands the school to hand it to you.

So the honest summary is this. Nobody may owe you a report today. Everybody owes you the records. Ask for both, today, in writing.

WHY IT MATTERS

You got a phone call, or you got a sentence at pickup, or you got nothing and found the bruise at bathtime. Whatever brought you here, you are frightened, and you are probably angry, and both of those are the correct response to your child being held down or shut in a room.

Two things are true at once, and you have to hold both.

The first is that this was done to a child who could not consent and may not be able to describe it. That deserves gravity. Take care of your child tonight before you take care of the paperwork. A child who has been restrained often does not want to go back to that building in the morning, and that reaction is not misbehavior.

The second is that the record of what happened is decaying while you sit with your child. School video systems overwrite on a schedule, often within days. Staff write their accounts within hours, and those accounts harden. Adults who were in the hallway will remember less each week. The single most useful thing you can do in the next 24 hours, other than caring for your child, is to freeze the record in place with one written request.

There is one more reason to write today, and it is the reason this tool sits in the behavior Part rather than the discipline Part. A restraint is not only an event. It is a data point about the plan. If the school is physically holding your child, the school has run out of other ideas - and the law is built on the premise that the plan should have had other ideas. Repeated restraint is evidence that the behavior support in the IEP is not working, and the team’s duty to revise an IEP that is not producing expected progress (34 C.F.R. § 300.324(b)(1)(ii)(A)) is triggered by exactly that kind of evidence. Where there is no FBA, repeated restraint is evidence that nobody has yet asked why the behavior is happening (Tool 56).

The incident is what happened to your child. The pattern is what is wrong with the plan. Write down both.

THE MOVE

• Care for your child first. If your child is hurt, or says he is hurt, or you see any mark, see a doctor today and say plainly what you were told happened. A medical record created today is independent evidence that no one can revise later. Photograph any marks, with a dated object in the frame.

• Write down what you were told, before you write anything else. Who called, at what time, in what words, and what your child said afterward, in your child’s words. Do it tonight, while it is exact. A note written the same day is a different kind of evidence than a memory reconstructed in March (Bonus 2, the Evidence Binder System, Tab 8).

• Send the incident-documentation request today. That is Appendix A, Letter 24. It asks for the written incident report, the district’s restraint and seclusion policy, all documentation of the event, and the preservation of any video before it is overwritten. Send it to the principal and the director of special education, and copy the superintendent if the incident was serious. Your authority to ask is your right to inspect and review your child’s education records (34 C.F.R. § 300.613; 34 C.F.R. § 99.10), plus whatever your state requires on top of it.

• Ask, in that same letter, what your state’s deadline is and whether the district met it. You do not have to know your state’s rule to ask the district to state it in writing. A district that has to name its own deadline in writing has to comply with it or explain itself. Then check the answer against the 50-State Companion.

• Ask for an IEP team meeting, in writing, this week. Say why: the behavior support in the IEP did not prevent this, and you want the team to review it. If the district refuses to convene, ask for prior written notice of the refusal (34 C.F.R. § 300.503(a)(2); Appendix A, Letter 4).

• Ask for an FBA if there is no current one, in writing. That is Appendix A, Letter 23 (Tool 56). Outside the discipline context there is no federal rule entitling your child to an FBA on request; the ask rests on the team’s duty to consider behavioral supports (34 C.F.R. § 300.324(a)(2)(i)) and, when appropriate, on the parent’s right to request an initial evaluation or reevaluation. Ask the district to say whether it will use the FBA as part of an evaluation, as instructional screening, or as a review of existing data. The first category triggers the IDEA evaluation rules and applicable consent requirements; the latter two do not automatically require IDEA consent (34 C.F.R. §§ 300.300, 300.304-300.311; U.S. Department of Education, 2024 FBA guidance, 11-14). If an FBA exists but predates the escalation, ask for a new one. If there is a behavior intervention plan, ask whether it was followed on the day of the incident, and ask for the documentation showing that it was (Tool 57).

• Record the time out of instruction. A partial day is a school day under § 300.11(c), but the discipline analysis is fact-specific. A school-initiated, behavior-driven shortened day generally is an informal removal unless the child continues to receive all 3: an opportunity to progress appropriately in the general curriculum, the services specified in the IEP, and participation with nondisabled children to the extent provided in the current placement. Whether a series of removals constitutes a change of placement remains a case-by-case determination under § 300.536 (OSEP 2022 Discipline Q&A, Questions C-6 through C-8).

• Log the incident in the pattern column. One line in your binder: date, what happened, duration, minutes of instruction missed, who was involved, what documents you received. Three lines like that, from three incidents, are the beginning of a pattern the team cannot call an isolated event.

• If your child has a Section 504 plan rather than an IEP, ask for an IDEA evaluation now (Appendix A, Letter 36). A 504 plan is not an IEP: Section 504 reaches more children, because it covers any physical or mental impairment that substantially limits a major life activity (34 C.F.R. § 104.3(j)), but it carries thinner procedures and none of the IDEA’s machinery of measurable annual goals and periodic progress reports (compare 34 C.F.R. §§ 104.33, 104.35 with 34 C.F.R. § 300.320). If your child has no plan at all, ask for an initial IDEA evaluation in writing (Appendix A, Letter 1); the parallel Section 504 evaluation request is Appendix A, Letter 35. A child being restrained is a child whose needs are not being met by whatever is currently on paper.

• Get counsel if this recurs, if your child was injured, or if the district’s account and your child’s account do not match. This is high-stakes ground where state law, civil rights law, and sometimes criminal and child-protection law overlap. The IDEA’s fee-shifting provision, 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(3), sometimes makes the district pay a prevailing parent’s fees.

THE TEMPLATE

Template A - the same-day incident note (for your file, not for the school)

Write this tonight. It is not sent to anyone. It is dated evidence of what you knew and when.

SAME-DAY INCIDENT NOTE - [CHILD’S FULL NAME] Date of incident: ____________ Date I am writing this: ____________

How I learned about it: ☐ phone call ☐ note home ☐ email ☐ my child told me ☐ other: ________ Who told me, and at what time: ______________________________ Their exact words, as close as I can get them: ______________________________ What my child said, in my child’s own words: ______________________________ Marks or injuries observed (and photographed at ____ time): ______________________________ Was my child sent home or picked up early? ☐ No ☐ Yes - time: ______ Minutes of instruction missed: ______ Documents the school gave me, and when: ______________________________ What I sent, and when: ______________________________

This template is educational material, not legal advice. Adapt it to your state and your facts; it is a starting point.

Template B - the same-day email (send with Letter 24)

Subject: Restraint/Seclusion Incident on [DATE] - Records Request and Request for an IEP Team Meeting - [CHILD’S FULL NAME], [GRADE], [SCHOOL]

[DATE]

Dear [PRINCIPAL] and [DIRECTOR OF SPECIAL EDUCATION]:

I am the parent of [CHILD’S FULL NAME], a [GRADE] student at [SCHOOL]. On [DATE OF INCIDENT], I was informed that my child was [RESTRAINED / SECLUDED / BOTH] at school. I was told: [1-2 SENTENCES - WHO TOLD YOU, WHEN, AND WHAT THEY SAID].

Records. Attached is my written request for all documentation of this incident, including the incident report, the district’s restraint and seclusion policy, staff statements, and any video or audio recording. I ask that all recordings of [DATE OF INCIDENT] be preserved now, before any scheduled deletion or overwriting. I make this request under my right to inspect and review my child’s education records (34 C.F.R. § 300.613; the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, 20 U.S.C. § 1232g) and under any applicable law of [STATE] and district policy.

Your state deadline. Please tell me in writing what notification and reporting deadlines the law of [STATE] and district policy set for incidents like this one, and whether they were met in this case.

Meeting. I request an IEP team meeting within [10 SCHOOL DAYS] to review my child’s behavior supports. The supports now in the IEP did not prevent this incident, and I want the team to consider positive behavioral interventions and supports to address the behavior at issue (34 C.F.R. § 300.324(a)(2)(i)) and to revise the IEP if it is not producing the progress expected (34 C.F.R. § 300.324(b)(1)(ii)(A)).

Assessment. [IF NO CURRENT FBA:] I also request a functional behavioral assessment of my child. My separate written request is attached.

[IF THE BIP EXISTS:] Please also provide the documentation showing whether my child’s behavior intervention plan was followed on [DATE OF INCIDENT].

If the district declines any request in this letter, I ask for prior written notice explaining the decision (34 C.F.R. § 300.503).

Please confirm receipt in writing by [DATE - 5 BUSINESS DAYS FROM SENDING].

Sincerely, [YOUR FULL NAME] [ADDRESS · PHONE · EMAIL]

This template is educational material, not legal advice. Adapt it to your state and your facts; it is a starting point.

Send by email with read receipt, or hand-deliver and ask for a date stamp. Keep a copy in your folder.

BEFORE YOU SEND - THE FIVE CHECKS ☐ Date at the top. The paper record starts here. ☐ Your child’s full name and school in the first line. ☐ Every [BRACKET] filled in - search the page for “[” before sending. ☐ Sent in writing, with proof: email read receipt, or hand-delivery with a date stamp. ☐ A copy in your folder, and the district’s response deadline on your calendar. This letter is educational material, not legal advice. Your state’s rules may differ - check your state regulations or your Parent Training and Information Center.

WHAT IT DOES - AND DOESN’T DO

It does freeze the record. Your right to inspect and review education records does not depend on whether your state requires an incident report: the district must comply without unnecessary delay, before any IEP meeting about your child, and in no case more than 45 days after you ask (34 C.F.R. § 300.613(a); Tool 84; Appendix A, Letter 2). Sending the request today also documents, with a timestamp, that the district was told to preserve the video while the video still existed.

It does put the incident in front of the IEP team as a plan failure rather than a child failure, and it starts the FBA question if no one has asked it (Tool 56).

It does not create a federal right to a same-day incident report. Check the current state rule and district policy. Ask promptly for any maintained incident record that is directly related to the child (34 C.F.R. §§ 300.611(b), 300.613(a)).

It does not by itself make the restraint unlawful or stop it from happening again. A single incident, lawfully performed under a state standard permitting restraint in an emergency, may be exactly what the school will say it was. What builds the case is the pattern: the same behavior, the same time of day, the same absence of an adequate plan, documented three times.

It does not guarantee that copies arrive. The federal floor grants inspection and review. Copies are required only where failure to provide them would effectively prevent you from exercising that right, and a district may charge a copying fee only if the fee does not effectively prevent you from inspecting and reviewing the records - though it may not charge you to search for or retrieve them (34 C.F.R. §§ 300.613(b)(2), 300.617). In practice most districts send copies. Ask for them.

It does not foreclose the civil-rights route. Section 504 and Title II apply to disability discrimination in restraint or seclusion. Use current regulations and fact-specific OCR materials. A complaint generally must be filed within 180 calendar days, subject to limited waivers. A state complaint under the IDEA is a separate route (34 C.F.R. §§ 300.151-300.153; Tool 90), and due process is another (Tool 92).

Get counsel if your child was injured, if restraint or seclusion is happening more than once, if your child cannot tell you what is being done to him, or if the district’s written account contradicts what your child says. Where the record and the child disagree, someone has to test the record. That is not a job to take on alone.

STATE NOTE

Restraint and seclusion is among the most state-dependent subjects in this book. Definitions, permitted uses, training, parent notice, written reports, and state reporting duties vary. Use the 50-State Companion and the district’s current written policy before asserting a rule or deadline.

Three things to look up before you argue with anyone, all of them on the 50-State Companion. First, does your state permit seclusion at all, and under what standard. Second, how fast must the school notify you, and in what form. Third, is a written incident report required, and by when.

Two more places to look. Your district’s own policy is usually posted on its website and is often stricter than state law; a district that violates its own policy has given you something to point at. And the U.S. Department of Education collects restraint and seclusion counts from districts through its Civil Rights Data Collection, under the record-keeping and reporting duty that applies to recipients of federal funds (34 C.F.R. § 100.6(b), applied to Section 504 by 34 C.F.R. § 104.61). Your district’s own reported numbers are public.

Check your state regulations and your Parent Training and Information Center (find yours at parentcenterhub.org). On this subject, call them. This is what they are for.

This week: tonight, write the same-day incident note in Template A and photograph any marks. Tomorrow morning, send Letter 24 with the Template B email, request the IEP meeting, and request the FBA if none exists. Before Friday, look up your state’s notification and reporting deadlines on the 50-State Companion, and write the district’s answer next to them in your binder.