{"id":3634,"date":"2010-08-09T11:31:39","date_gmt":"2010-08-09T15:31:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/?p=3634"},"modified":"2014-08-26T14:59:33","modified_gmt":"2014-08-26T18:59:33","slug":"i-want-to-make-a-difference-is-special-ed-law-for-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/i-want-to-make-a-difference-is-special-ed-law-for-me\/","title":{"rendered":"I Want to Make a Difference. Is Special Ed Law for Me?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_pop\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/gallery\/share-button-gray.png\" style=\"border:0px\" alt=\"Share\" \/><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"StumbleUpon\",\"Digg\",\"Reddit\",\"Bebo\",\"Delicious\");var hupso_icon_type = \"labels\";var hupso_background=\"#FFFFFF\";var hupso_border=\"#FFFFFF\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_twitter_via=\"wrightslaw\";var hupso_url=\"\";var hupso_title=\"I%20Want%20to%20Make%20a%20Difference.%20Is%20Special%20Ed%20Law%20for%20Me%3F\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div><blockquote><p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright\" style=\"border: 1px solid black; margin: 2px; float: right;\" src=\"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/images\/law.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"113\" \/>(1)\u00a0 I&#8217;m finishing my undergraduate degree in Special Education and want to work in Special Ed law. Do I need a doctorate and a law degree? I don&#8217;t care about the huge corporate jobs.\u00a0 I just want to make a difference.<\/p>\n<p>(2)\u00a0 I am interested in Special Ed law.\u00a0 How does a lay person get involved at a higher level?\u00a0 Are there law schools that allow you to specialize in this field?<\/p>\n<p>(3)\u00a0 I advocated for my two children for many years. I also attended IEP meetings with other parents to provide advocacy and support. Now, I&#8217;m interested in law school. What do you recommend?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>So you want to go to law school?<\/strong> We are asked this question many times a week. Because there was so much interest, <!--more--> we created several pages of information for those who wanted to know more.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/lawschool\/index.htm\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Special Education Law and Advocacy Clinics<\/span><\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/lawschool\/index.htm\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/lawschool\/index.htm<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/lawschool\/final.exam.htm\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Special Education Law and Advocacy, Final Exam<\/span><\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/lawschool\/final.exam.htm\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/lawschool\/final.exam.htm<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<p>On these pages you can:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Preview an oral argument.\u00a0 See a Law 363 student in oral argument in an LRE case.<\/li>\n<li>Take a test of your knowledge &#8211; try a final law exam.<\/li>\n<li>Find a law school or disability related program throughout the US.<\/li>\n<li>Read articles about a New Generation of Advocates.<\/li>\n<li>Link to other Wrightslaw tests or quizzes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong>Special Education Law School and Advocacy Clinics<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Most of you know that Pete and Pam were Adjunct Professors of Law at William and Mary Law School and advised <a href=\"http:\/\/law.wm.edu\/news\/stories\/2009\/briet-and-wrights-lauded-for-contributions-to-parents-engaged-for-learning-equality-initiative.php\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">PELE, the Special Education Advocacy Clinic<\/span><\/a><span style=\"color: #000080;\">. <span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Clinic<\/span> <\/span>assists children with special needs and their families with eligibility or Individualized Education Program meetings, discipline matters, mediation, and administrative hearings.<\/p>\n<p>Because of the critical shortage of legal assistance for parents of children with disabilities, law schools around the country are developing children&#8217;s programs and advocacy clinics.<\/p>\n<p>Student lawyers provide representation and advocacy to youth, families, and caregivers in special education and school discipline matters, community outreach and education, school reform litigation, policy research, and advocacy.<\/p>\n<p>Students have the opportunity in a real-life context to hone their lawyering skills such as interviewing, negotiating, counseling, pre-trial litigation, and oral advocacy.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong>Get Lots of Trial Experience<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Pete advises, &#8220;If you want to be an attorney who specializes in special ed litigation, focus on a law degree and get lots of trial experience. In the beginning years get experience litigating criminal defense, civil rights, divorce, and take lots of continuing legal ed course on cross-examination.<\/p>\n<p>A special ed case is often a mixture of a medical malpractice wrongful death case that has merged with a very messy, emotional divorce, custody, and alimony case &#8211; a battle of expert witnesses arguing over shades of gray where each feels betrayed by the other.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(1)\u00a0 I&#8217;m finishing my undergraduate degree in Special Education and want to work in Special Ed law. Do I need a doctorate and a law degree? I don&#8217;t care about <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/i-want-to-make-a-difference-is-special-ed-law-for-me\/\">Continue Reading \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,137,35,57,8,5,18,346,7,11],"tags":[1320,632,631,633,270,1298,304],"class_list":["post-3634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-advocacy","category-attorneys","category-eligibility","category-fape","category-faqs","category-idea-2004","category-ieps","category-law-school","category-legal-news","category-special-ed-law","tag-attorneys","tag-disability-law","tag-education-law","tag-law-students","tag-pele","tag-special-ed-law","tag-william-and-mary-law-school"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3634"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3634\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11881,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3634\/revisions\/11881"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}