Arkansas IEP Evaluation Timeline, Dispute Routes and Parent Resources (2026)
- Evaluation window
- 60 days
- The clock starts at
- Parental consent
- State complaint deadline
- One year
- Due process deadline
- Two years
How long does a school in Arkansas have to complete an IEP evaluation?
An Arkansas district has 60 calendar days from written parental consent to finish an initial evaluation. That is the federal default rather than a window Arkansas set for itself, though two Arkansas clocks sit on either side of it. Before consent, the state rule runs a referral step: a written referral goes to the principal or a designee, then a referral conference decides whether to evaluate, held within 21 calendar days of the referral under the department's process guide. After the last test, an Evaluation/Programming Conference follows within 30 calendar days, where a group of qualified professionals plus the parent decide eligibility and can write the first IEP in the same meeting. When a family disagrees with a district, the Dispute Resolution Section of the Office of Special Education investigates written state complaints going back one year with a team of two to five people, hearings go to contracted attorneys assigned in rotation, while mediation and facilitated IEP meetings run through a law school clinic at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.
The evaluation timeline in Arkansas
| Initial evaluation window | 60 days |
|---|---|
| The clock starts at | parental consent to evaluate |
| Against the federal rule | The federal default, unchanged |
IDEA sets a default of 60 calendar days from parental consent for an initial evaluation (34 CFR 300.301(c)(1)). Arkansas keeps that default rather than setting a timeframe of its own.
Arkansas follows the federal 60 day default for completing testing. A separate Evaluation and Programming Conference to determine eligibility must then be held within 30 calendar days of finishing the testing.
Source: 005.18.10 Ark. Code R. 001 (Special Education Procedural Requirements and Programs Standards) www.law.cornell.edu/regulations/arkansas/005-18-10-Ark-Code-R-001
The same window sits beside all fifty-one jurisdictions on the evaluation timelines by state table, which explains where the federal deadline comes from. To pull one state's window on its own, the evaluation deadline checker returns that single result.
Reevaluation and IEP review cadence in Arkansas
Arkansas does not set its own cadence here, so the federal defaults are what apply. A reevaluation happens at least once every three years unless the parent and the school agree one is not needed. It happens no more often than once a year unless they agree otherwise (34 CFR 300.303(b)). The IEP team reviews the IEP at least once a year to check progress against the annual goals (34 CFR 300.324(b)(1)).
If you disagree in Arkansas
IDEA gives families in every state the same three routes when a disagreement with the school does not resolve at the team table. What changes at the state line is who administers each route, how long you have to file and the local detail below.
The state complaint
Handled by the Arkansas Division of Elementary and Secondary Education, through the Dispute Resolution Section of its Office of Special Education. Time limit to file: one year, counted back from the date the department receives the complaint.
An organization or an individual can file, including someone from another state. Arkansas takes the complaint in writing with a signature, or in person by recorded deposition or statement, which is a route most states do not offer. The department publishes a form for it, though the form is optional and a plain letter carrying the same content works. The complaint names the requirement the public agency is said to have broken, the facts behind that, the child's details where the complaint is about one child plus a proposed resolution. A copy goes to the school district at the same moment the complaint goes to the department. Arkansas then runs the investigation as a small team rather than a single investigator. Within 10 business days of receiving the complaint the director designates the team, which is at least 2 people and no more than 5, then both the person who filed plus the agency under investigation get written notice naming the team members with a description of the general process. The team can collect data on site or off site, interview people plus observe. The person who filed can add information orally or in writing. The district gets its own chance to respond, which can include a proposal to resolve the complaint plus an offer of voluntary mediation. The written report lands within 60 calendar days of receipt with a summary of the allegations, the investigative activity, findings of fact, conclusions, the reasons behind the decision plus any corrective action, which can reach monetary reimbursement or future services. The director can extend that window for exceptional circumstances, or where both sides agree to try mediation. One Arkansas sequencing rule is worth knowing: where a complaint issue is already part of a pending due process hearing, that part is set aside until the hearing ends, while any issue outside the hearing keeps running on the complaint timeline. An issue already decided in a hearing between the same parties is binding when it turns up again in a complaint.
Source: 6 CAR Section 130-1201, which states the written signed or in person recorded route at (a), the required content at (c), the one year limit at (d) plus the copy to the district at (e), with the referral to the Special Education Unit at 130-1202(a), the 10 business day team designation with written notice at 130-1202(b), the 2 to 5 member team at 130-1203, the 60 calendar day investigation at 130-1204(a) with the report contents at 130-1206(b) and its delivery at 130-1206(c), the fact finding steps at 130-1205 plus the set aside rules at 130-1207; the same one year window sits at 34 CFR 300.153(c) with the 60 day limit at 34 CFR 300.152(a); the optional form plus the Dispute Resolution Section as the receiving office come from the department's own State Complaint page with its State Complaint form dese.ade.arkansas.gov/Files/ADE_Spec._Ed._-_Complaint_Procedures_-_6CARpt.130-Subpart12_Legal.pdf
Mediation
Arkansas hands this route to a law school. The Arkansas Special Education Mediation Project runs through the Mediation Clinic at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock William H. Bowen School of Law, with the department's Dispute Resolution Section keeping oversight. The same clinic runs facilitated IEP meetings, where an impartial facilitator keeps the meeting moving without making decisions for the team, writing the IEP or giving legal advice. Both services are free to families plus free to districts. Mediation is voluntary for both sides, it cannot be used to delay or deny a due process hearing plus the state carries the cost. The department keeps a list of mediators who know special education law. It picks from that list on a random, rotational or other impartial basis rather than letting either side choose. A mediator cannot work for the department or for the district involved with the child. Sessions are scheduled promptly at a place that suits both sides. Where a hearing request has already been filed, the rule aims to hold the prehearing mediation conference within 7 calendar days of the department receiving that request. One Arkansas rule shapes the room: attorneys do not attend the prehearing mediation session, on the reasoning that their presence could make the session adversarial, though either side can still take advice from its own attorney about a settlement proposal. An agreement is written down, signed by the parent plus someone who can bind the district, then enforceable in a state court or a federal district court.
Source: 6 CAR Section 130-1012, which states the voluntary process at (c)(1)(A) with the bar on using it to deny or delay a hearing at (c)(1)(B), the state list with impartial selection at (c)(2), the timely convenient sessions at (c)(3), the state bearing the cost at (c)(4), the 7 calendar day prehearing conference at (c)(5), the attorney rule with its advice exception at (c)(6)(A) and (B), the signed binding agreement at (c)(7), enforceability at (c)(8) plus the mediator conflict bar at (d); the federal counterpart is 34 CFR 300.506; the University of Arkansas at Little Rock William H. Bowen School of Law running mediation plus facilitated IEP meetings comes from the department's Dispute Resolution page naming the Bowen School of Law Mediation Clinic as the administrator of the project, its Mediation and IEP Facilitation page plus the project's own page at the law school dese.ade.arkansas.gov/Files/ADE_Spec._Ed._-_Mediation_&_Hearings_-_6CARpt.130-Subpart10_Legal.pdf
A due process hearing
Time limit to file: two years from the date the parent or the district knew or should have known about the action the complaint is based on.
The request goes to the other side, with a copy forwarded to the department. Arkansas keeps these cases in house rather than sending them to a separate hearings agency. The Office of Special Education processes the filing then assigns a hearing officer from its own contracted pool. Regular cases go out in rotation, expedited discipline cases do not, plus neither side can ask for a particular person. Arkansas asks more of that person than the federal minimum: a hearing officer here is a licensed attorney in good standing with the Arkansas Bar who works under a professional consultant contract with the department plus cannot be an employee of the department or of any Arkansas district, cooperative or open enrollment charter school. The department's guide for hearing officers also tells them it is not appropriate to accept payment from parents, districts, schools or cooperatives. A challenge to that person's impartiality goes in writing to the department within 7 days of the assignment notice, on the ground of bias, with written evidence behind it. The shape of the case follows the federal pattern of a resolution period followed by a 45 day decision window, which a hearing officer can extend for good cause on a written request detailing the need. Neither party can waive the 45 day rule. Discipline appeals run on a faster track, with the expedited hearing inside 20 school days of the filing plus a decision within 10 school days of the hearing. At the start of the hearing the hearing officer decides which party carries the burden of proof on the issues raised. Parents can have their child present plus open the hearing to the public. The record with the findings and the decision costs the family nothing. Decisions go to the Advisory Council for the Education of Children with Disabilities plus the public with identifying details removed, which is why redacted Arkansas decisions sit on the department's own site. Arkansas runs one level of hearing, so a party who disagrees goes to state or federal court within 90 days of the decision. The two year filing limit lifts where a district misrepresented that it had resolved the problem or withheld information it was required to give the family.
Source: 6 CAR Section 130-1004(f)(1), which states the two year filing limit in those words, with both exceptions at 130-1004(f)(2) plus the same two year limit worded from the violation date at 130-1003(b), the filing party serving the other side with a copy forwarded to the department at 130-1005(1)(B) and (C), the expedited timelines at 130-1004(d) and 130-1018, the department assigning the hearing officer at 130-1009(1), the impartiality plus qualification rules at 130-1019, the written bias challenge inside 7 days of the assignment notice at 130-1023(a)(3) and (b), hearing rights at 130-1013, parental rights at 130-1014, publication of decisions at 130-1015, the 45 day decision at 130-1016(a) with extensions at 130-1017 and no waiver at 130-1017(d), the burden of proof ruling at 130-1029(a), the court route at 130-1038 plus the 90 day filing limit at 130-1039; the federal counterparts are 34 CFR 300.511(e) and (f), 34 CFR 300.515(a) plus 34 CFR 300.516(b); the Arkansas Bar requirement, the professional consultant contract, the rotating assignment with expedited cases left out of it, the bar on requesting a particular hearing officer plus the instruction not to accept payment from parents or districts come from the department's Independent Hearing Officer Procedural Guide dese.ade.arkansas.gov/Files/ADE_Spec._Ed._-_Mediation_&_Hearings_-_6CARpt.130-Subpart10_Legal.pdf
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Who to contact in Arkansas
- The state special education office. Arkansas Division of Elementary and Secondary Education, Office of Special Education. This is the office that answers questions about Arkansas rules and receives a state complaint.
- Your rights in writing. Your Rights Under the IDEA, the Part B procedural safeguards notice the department publishes as revised July 2010. Every district hands parents this notice at least once a year (34 CFR 300.504). It is the plain summary of what you can ask for at each step.
- Parent training and information center. The Center for Exceptional Families, the Arkansas Parent Training and Information Center. A parent center is free and federally funded under IDEA. Staff there talk families through the process in their own state at no cost.
- The state rules themselves. 6 CAR Part 130 (Procedural Requirements and Program Standards), the special education part of Title 6, Chapter I, Subchapter E of the Code of Arkansas Rules, resting on the Children with Disabilities Act of 1973 at Arkansas Code 6-41-201 et seq. together with Part B of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. Part 130 is the single part behind almost everything on this page. Its 26 subparts run from child find and referral through evaluation, eligibility, IEPs, least restrictive environment, discipline, mediation and hearings, state complaints, surrogate parents, residential placement, extended school year services plus early childhood special education for ages three through five. The disability categories with the testing each one requires sit next door in Part 131. Two numbering points save a parent some confusion. The rules Arkansas has published since 2008 as Special Education and Related Services: Procedural Requirements and Program Standards are the same rules. The Code of Arkansas Rules that renumbered them into the 6 CAR form became the official version on 1 January 2025, so older Arkansas material cites the same requirements as sections like 4.03 or 6.03 instead. The state law underneath is the Children with Disabilities Act of 1973, which the rule text itself names as its authority at Arkansas Code 6-41-202 et seq.
Child Find in Arkansas
Arkansas puts child find on the school district rather than describing it as a state duty alone. The duty starts at birth. Each district is responsible for identifying, locating plus evaluating children with disabilities from birth to 21 inside its own boundaries, whatever the severity, which reaches children attending private and religious schools in the district, children who move often including children of migrant families, children who are homeless or wards of the state plus children who are passing from grade to grade. Two Arkansas mechanics sit on top of that. Before any major identification, location or evaluation activity, a notice to families is published or announced in newspapers or other media with enough local circulation to reach the whole district. Each district also writes a child find plan and keeps it, setting out its annual activities including a public awareness campaign plus routine school screening, with the written plan and the record of what was done open to department staff. Families of babies and toddlers under three usually come in through the state's First Connections early intervention program, which supports children from birth to the third birthday, though the district's own child find duty starts at birth as well.
Source: 6 CAR Section 130-301(a) for the birth to 21 district duty with the four groups it names, 130-301(c) for the published notice before a major child find activity, 130-303(a) and (b) for the written plan with its annual public awareness campaign and routine screening plus 130-303(c)(2) for those records being open to department staff; the federal duty sits at 34 CFR 300.111; the birth to third birthday range for First Connections comes from that program's own site dese.ade.arkansas.gov/Files/ADE_Spec._Ed._-_Child_Find_-_6CARpt.130-Subpart3_Legal.pdf
