Legal Question in Education Law in Massachusetts

Re: IEP and joint legal custody

You need to stop dealing with the team. You should forward va certified letter to the school board, copy to the school superintendent, with a copy of the order containing the shared legal custody terms. Advise the Board that you expect that every teacher will fully cooperate with all of your requests for information, and offer to provide pre-addressed, per-posted envelopes to the team coordinator.

Many divorced parents have this difficulty. It helps when you take a top-down approach. If some smarmy administrator tells you it's too much trouble, point out that the 50% divorce rate and the inflated rate of never-married parents means that 50% or more of their children have parents who are apart.

I can't cite you chapter and verse, but you have the clear right to full cooperation here unless you have been denied school records or other copntact by a judge.

Re: IEP and joint legal custody

One other thing -- you have the right to bring an attorney or educational advocate with you to IEP meetings and such. The presence of such an "escalation" usually gets attention.