The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) provides a substantive guarantee to a “free appropriate public education” (FAPE) to students with disabilities. The education is to be provided “in conformity with” an “individualized education program” (IEP): an educational plan for the student that is created through a statutorily defined process. Scholars and courts have focused tremendous attention on the level of educational quality that an IEP must offer to meet the IDEA’s requirements. But the creation of an adequate plan is, of course, not the end of the story; the school district then has to implement the plan. This leaves an important question: How far may a school district deviate from the services specified in an IEP and remain in compliance with the IDEA? In other words, how much of the adequate written plan is the student in fact entitled to receive? There are two existing approaches to failure-to-implement cases: the materiality approach and the per se test. 

This Comment argues that both approaches are flawed. The materiality standard circumvents the procedural protections of the IDEA, provides little predictability to parents and schools, offers little guidance to courts, forces judges away from areas of institutional competence, and incentivizes school districts to overpromise and underdeliver. The per se rule, on the other hand, is insufficiently flexible given its practical and statutory constraints, would disincentivize ambition and innovation in IEPs, and is unlikely to be adopted by courts. 

This Comment proposes a new approach—a burden-shifting test that accounts for both (1) unforeseen or unavoidable circumstances and (2) the proportionality of the school’s response to those circumstances. This approach integrates the benefits of both the materiality inquiry and the per se rule. It better honors several important aspects of the statutory scheme, better aligns with the statutory text, and accords with Supreme Court precedent. It also encourages IEP drafters to craft realistic plans that nonetheless aspire to deliver the best results for students.

《残障人士教育法》（IDEA）为残障学生“免费适当的公共教育”（FAPE）提供了实质性保障。教育将“按照”“个性化教育计划”（IEP）提供：通过法定程序为学生制定的教育计划。学者和法院非常关注 IEP 必须提供的满足 IDEA 要求的教育质量水平。但是，制定一个适当的计划当然不是故事的结局。然后学区必须实施该计划。这就留下了一个重要的问题：学区可以在多大程度上偏离 IEP 中指定的服务并继续遵守 IDEA？换句话说，学生实际上有权获得多少适当的书面计划？有两种现有的方法来解决未能实施的案例：重要性方法和本身测试。 

该评论认为这两种方法都有缺陷。重要性标准规避了 IDEA 的程序保护，对家长和学校几乎没有可预测性，对法院几乎没有指导，迫使法官远离机构能力范围，并激励学区过度承诺和交付不足。另一方面，鉴于其实际和法定限制，该规则本身不够灵活，会抑制 IEP 的雄心和创新，并且不太可能被法院采用。 

本评论提出了一种新方法——一种负担转移测试，它同时考虑了 (1) 不可预见或不可避免的情况，以及 (2) 学校对这些情况的反应的相称性。这种方法整合了重要性调查和本身规则的好处。它更好地尊重了法定方案的几个重要方面，更好地与法定文本保持一致，并符合最高法院的判例。它还鼓励 IEP 起草者制定切合实际的计划，但仍渴望为学生提供最好的结果。