Restraint & Seclusion

Efforts to enact first-ever federal legislation to regulate the use of restraint and seclusion in the nation’s schools dominated disability issues on Capitol Hill this year.

Reaching a high point in March, the House of Representatives approved landmark legislation prohibiting restraint or seclusion unless a student posed imminent danger and the techniques could be administered by a trained staff member. The bill also disallowed certain techniques such as the use of mechanical restraints and barred schools from including restraint or seclusion in a child’s individualized education program, or IEP.

But advocates struggled to gain traction in the Senate, facing opposition from some educators’ groups and ultimately division amongst themselves. By November, Senate staffers said the measure would not proceed this year, saying too little time remained to move forward.

Now advocates say they are regrouping to push for restraint and seclusion legislation in 2011. Meanwhile, Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, who chairs the Senate’s Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee where restraint and seclusion legislation would be considered, now says he would like to see the issue addressed within an upcoming reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.

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