Standing outside Fort Worth ISD's administration building on Tuesday, a group of parents and advocates accused the district of breaking state and federal law by failing to provide special education services in a timely manner. They say Individualized Education Programs, known as IEPs, are not being followed and that parent concerns are routinely dismissed, with some families waiting years for accommodations their children are legally entitled to receive.
The press conference, held ahead of a Fort Worth ISD board meeting that began at 5 p.m. the same day, was organized by Caroline James, executive director of Literacy Fort Worth, as reported by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. James said the problem is not confined to one district — she has attended more than 100 special education meetings across 10 school districts and said no district is doing an especially great job. Those meetings, known as Admission, Review and Dismissal or ARD meetings, are where schools evaluate what services a student may need.
James argued that these meetings should include experts and educators without language that shuts parents out of the process, and said the issue is widespread across multiple Tarrant County districts. Fort Worth ISD had provided no comment on the parents' claims as of Wednesday afternoon, the same account notes.
A Mother's 3.5-Year Fight for Testing
Kim Medford, a Fort Worth ISD parent, said she struggled for 3.5 years to obtain testing and accommodations for her son's dyslexia and other learning disabilities. By the time he entered sixth grade, he was reading at a first-grade level and had a failing reading grade of 30, according to the same report. Medford said his teachers still do not all follow his IEP this school year.
Just two weeks before the press conference, Medford received a notice from her son's dyslexia teacher stating he was doing well and nearing discharge from services — a characterization that stands in tension with the ongoing struggles she described. The dossier does not reconcile those two accounts, and the Star-Telegram's reporting presents both without resolving the discrepancy.
Another Parent Describes a Pattern of Missed Minutes
Ashish Talwar, a parent of a Fort Worth ISD first grader, said his family has repeatedly had to insist that their son's A-rated school follow his IEP. His son's plan requires time in a general education classroom with peers, but Talwar said his family did not receive the required general-education minutes for months during the previous school year.
Talwar said staff and Superintendent Peter Licata told him federal law exempts schools from following an IEP for the first 10 school days — an explanation he disputes. He said parents should not have to audit daily whether IEP services are actually being delivered. The U.S. Department of Education says services must be provided as soon as possible after an IEP is created, per the agency's own guidance.
What State Timelines Require
Texas rules give schools 15 school days to allow a parent to provide written consent after requesting special education testing, and 45 school days to complete testing once consent is given, according to Disability Rights Texas. After testing, school staff have 30 calendar days to convene an ARD meeting. Those timelines frame the delays parents described at the press conference.
Pete Geren is chair of the Fort Worth ISD Board of Managers and also serves as president and chief executive officer of the Sid W. Richardson Foundation, which is a funder of the Star-Telegram's Crossroads Lab, the outlet disclosed in its own reporting.
A Regional Pattern, With One District Already Cited
The concerns raised by Fort Worth families echo problems documented elsewhere in Tarrant County. The Texas Education Agency found that neighboring Aledo Independent School District violated federal special education laws involving more than a dozen students with disabilities, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Aledo ISD said it takes seriously its obligation to serve the roughly 1,100 students who receive special services there and maintained no staff member knowingly acted out of compliance in the instances identified by the state.
In Aledo, parent Heather Parmenter said district officials insisted on a plan that removed her son Bo from his regular classroom for almost the entire school day, while parent Carol Caron said her daughter Ellie spent most of her day in a resource room with limited meaningful inclusion among general education peers. Those findings apply specifically to Aledo ISD and do not establish that Fort Worth ISD committed the same violations.
Dyslexia Screening Efforts Fill Gaps Beyond the Classroom
Outside the formal IEP process, community programs have tried to catch children who fall through the cracks. Literacy Roundup, an initiative spearheaded by Literacy Fort Worth, the city of Fort Worth and the Sid Richardson Foundation, aims to screen and identify students with dyslexia. The program has operated at community centers and libraries across the city, including a summer stretch at six locations, according to the Fort Worth Report.
One family's experience illustrates what the program can do. Kim Medford's other son, Noah, a sixth grader at William Monnig Middle School, had long been suspected of being dyslexic. He had repeated second grade after his private school said it lacked the resources to properly support him, and a Literacy Roundup screening estimated he was reading at a second-grade level before the program determined he was dyslexic and helped Medford build a plan to ask the right questions at his school, the Fort Worth Report found.
Fort Worth's reading challenges extend well beyond any single family. About half of students living in Fort Worth cannot read proficiently, according to a Fort Worth Education Partnership analysis cited by the same outlet. Meanwhile, the Texas Education Agency reports that just 6% of Fort Worth ISD students are identified as dyslexic, compared with an estimated 15% to 20% of the broader U.S. population, per the Fort Worth Star-Telegram's separate reporting. Nearby districts post similarly modest rates — 5.3% in Lake Worth ISD, 6.1% in Crowley ISD, 6.2% in Castleberry ISD and 8% in Eagle Mountain-Saginaw ISD.
Staffing Cuts and a Widening Trust Gap
Fort Worth ISD reduced positions including diagnostic evaluation specialists, occupational therapists, speech therapists, ARD managers and special program directors following the state takeover, the Star-Telegram has reported. Some Fort Worth-area parents have tried for years to get their children tested for dyslexia, the outlet noted, a pattern consistent with Medford's own 3.5-year experience.
The frustration voiced at Tuesday's press conference also surfaced at a district listening session last month. More than 180 parents and community members attended Superintendent Licata's Sept. 1 session at Arlington Heights High School, where, per the Fort Worth Report, parents and students raised the same concerns again and again: a rigid curriculum, teacher turnover and poor communication. One parent described feeling very us versus them with the district. District leaders at that session also conceded they had not adequately communicated a change preventing parents from walking their children into Diamond Hill Elementary, a separate example of the communication gaps families say have become routine.
Fort Worth ISD's Specialized Learning Division states on its website that it provides exceptional learners with a continuum of services and supports, including individualized care, evidence-based practices and early intervention. Whether that mission matches what families describe on the ground remains the central dispute raised by parents and advocates at Tuesday's press conference, and Fort Worth ISD had not responded to the specific claims as of Wednesday afternoon.
