On November 20, the Jewish Law Institute at Touro Law Center will be hosting a presentation on “Best Practices & Special Education.” The program is part of Touro Law’s Disability Rights and Inclusion Project, which is dedicated to promoting disability rights and awareness, within Jewish communities and beyond. Components of the project include both public events and scholarly publications.
The goal of the presentation is to educate attorneys, parents, and the public on legal guidelines and strategies for obtaining private school placement at public expense, as well as to provide tips for navigating the special education process, from making a referral to a local school district, participating in Individualized Education Program (IEP) meetings, and visiting proposed placements by the District.
The speaker will be Solange Captan, Esq., who has served as Director of Tuition and Counsel for SINAI Schools since July of 2017. SINAI currently operates seven special education schools across New Jersey and New York, serving elementary and high school students (through age 21) with a wide range of complex learning and developmental disabilities. Prior to joining SINAI, Ms. Captan was a lawyer in the Special Education Unit of the New York City Department of Education’s Office of General Counsel.
The program will build on past events organized by Touro Law’s Disability Rights and Inclusion Project. Last year’s programs consisted of presentations by Dr. Frances Victory, who spoke about “Understanding the Individualized Education Program – How School Teachers and Staff Can Help Parents Make the Best Choices for Their Child,” and Eileen Buckley, Esq., an attorney at the Long Island Advocacy Center, housed at Touro Law, whose topic was “Legal Aspects of the Special Education Process.” Their presentations can be viewed here.
In addition, the Jewish Law Institute recently co-sponsored a special Symposium Issue of the Touro Law Review on the subject of “Current Issues in Disability Rights Law.” The issue includes articles by leading scholars and advocates of disability rights from across the United States.
The November 20 program will begin at 12:50 p.m., at Touro Law Center, 225 Eastview Drive, Central Islip, NY 11722. The event is free and open to the public, and lunch will be served. Attendees will be eligible to receive one hour of Continuing Legal Education (CLE) Credit in the area of Diversity, Inclusion and Elimination of Bias. Registration is available at events@tourolaw.edu, and the presentation will be live-streamed at TOUROLAW.EDU/LIVEEVENT.
For more information, please contact Samuel J. Levine, Professor of Law and Director of the Jewish Law Institute at Touro Law Center: slevine@tourolaw.edu Professor Levine is the author of Was Yosef on The Spectrum? Understanding Joseph Through Torah, Midrash and Classical Jewish Sources (Urim Publications, 2018), Jewish Law and American Law, A Comparative Study (Touro College Press, 2018), and more than fifty law review articles and book chapters. He has served as the Beznos Distinguished Professor at Michigan State University College of Law, and he has taught at the law schools of Bar-Ilan, Fordham, Pepperdine, and St. John’s Universities.
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