What Child Find actually requires
Child Find is codified at 20 U.S.C. § 1412(a)(3) and implemented at 34 C.F.R. § 300.111. The statute conditions every state's IDEA funding on a working system to ensure that all children with disabilities residing in the state, including children who are homeless, children who are wards of the state, and children attending private schools, regardless of the severity of the disability, and who need special education and related services, are identified, located, and evaluated. The duty is affirmative. It belongs to the district, it exists before any referral is filed, and it does not depend on a parent asking.
Precision about where the operative language lives matters more than most summaries admit. The phrase "advancing from grade to grade" does not appear in the statute. It comes from the implementing regulation: 34 C.F.R. § 300.111(c)(1) extends Child Find to children suspected of having a disability even though they are advancing from grade to grade, and subsection (c)(2) adds highly mobile children, including migrant children. The distinction is not trivia. It means the most common informal defense a campus offers, that the student is passing and being promoted, was answered by the U.S. Department of Education in the text of the regulation itself. A hearing officer will know that. The district's file should read as though the district knew it too.
Child Find has a parallel duty under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, and a student who does not need specially designed instruction may still be owed an evaluation on that side of the house. We cover the line between the two frameworks in our analysis of Section 504 versus the IDEA and in our Section 504 compliance practice. This article stays on the IDEA side, where Texas has bolted specific statutory clocks onto the federal duty.
The Fifth Circuit standard that decides these disputes
In Texas, Child Find liability is measured against Krawietz v. Galveston Independent School District, 900 F.3d 673 (5th Cir. 2018). The Fifth Circuit held that a district must identify, locate, and evaluate students with suspected disabilities within a reasonable time after the district is on notice of facts or behavior likely to indicate a disability. Texas hearing officers apply that holding as a three-part inquiry: when did notice arise, when was the duty satisfied, and was the gap between the two reasonable.
That framing should change how a district thinks about its defense. The question is never whether the district eventually evaluated. It is what the district was actually doing, week by week, between the date notice arose and the date the referral moved. A file that shows a structured intervention running, data being collected on a schedule, and the Child Find question being asked and answered in writing at each review supports a finding that the delay was reasonable. A file with a four-month silence in the middle reads as the violation itself, no matter how thorough the eventual evaluation was.
The disputes we see concentrate in four fact patterns campuses most often miss.
1. Sustained failure despite documented intervention
A student who has spent more than a full grading cycle in intensive tiers of a multi-tiered system of supports without measurable progress is a presumptive trigger. The intervention data the campus has been collecting is not a substitute for an evaluation. It is the evidence that a referral was warranted.
2. A pattern of disciplinary removals tied to behavior
Repeated disciplinary referrals, in-school suspensions, or out-of-school suspensions tied to behavior that interferes with learning become notice at the point a reasonable educator would suspect the behavior is symptomatic of a disability rather than ordinary misconduct. A campus that tracks cumulative removal days for discipline purposes should treat a climbing count as a Child Find flag as well, and raise the evaluation question in writing before the count becomes the story.
3. A medical diagnosis disclosed by a parent
A parent who tells the campus that a child has been diagnosed with autism, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, dyslexia, or any other condition known to affect learning has put the district on notice. The district is not required to accept the diagnosis as conclusive of eligibility. It is required to decide, within a reasonable time, whether an evaluation is warranted, and to document that decision.
4. An English learner whose struggle is attributed entirely to language
English-learner status does not extinguish Child Find. When an EL student is significantly behind same-language peers in academic growth, the district must consider whether a disability, rather than language acquisition, is driving the gap. Treating every EL struggle as a language issue is a high-frequency Texas complaint pattern.
The two Texas clocks: 15 school days and 45 school days
This is the piece of Texas special education law that districts most often get wrong, usually by collapsing two separate deadlines into one. Section 29.004 of the Texas Education Code, and the commissioner's rule at Section 89.1011 of Title 19 of the Texas Administrative Code, set out two clocks that measure different things, start on different events, and end with different deliverables.
The 15-school-day clock answers a parent's written request. Under Section 29.004(c) of the Education Code, when a parent or legal guardian makes a written request for a full individual and initial evaluation, the FIIE, to the district's director of special education services or to a district administrative employee, the district must act not later than the 15th school day after receiving the request. Acting means one of two things: provide the parent an opportunity to give written consent for the evaluation, or refuse to evaluate and provide the parent notice of procedural safeguards. The commissioner's rule adds that the response must include prior written notice under 34 C.F.R. § 300.503 and a copy of the procedural safeguards notice. Note what this clock does not do. It does not run from consent, and it does not require the evaluation to be finished. It ends when the consent paperwork, or a written refusal, is in the parent's hands.
The 45-school-day clock completes the evaluation. Under Section 29.004(a)(1) of the Education Code, the written report of the FIIE must be completed not later than the 45th school day after the district receives the parent's signed written consent. If the student is absent from school three or more school days during the evaluation period, the deadline extends by the number of school days the student was absent. This clock starts on consent, not on the parent's original request, and it ends with a finished evaluation report, not a form.
| 15 school days | 45 school days | |
|---|---|---|
| Starts when | The district receives a parent's written request for an FIIE | The district receives the parent's signed written consent |
| Ends with | An opportunity to consent, or a written refusal with notice of procedural safeguards | A completed written FIIE report |
| Source | Education Code Section 29.004(c); 19 TAC Section 89.1011 | Education Code Section 29.004(a)(1); 19 TAC Section 89.1011 |
The gap between the clocks is the trap. A district can satisfy the 15-day clock, hand over the consent form on day fourteen, and then watch the form sit unsigned for six weeks before the 45-day clock ever starts. Nothing in the statute times that middle stretch. Krawietz does. The reasonableness inquiry covers the whole span from notice to evaluation, so a district that treats an unsigned consent form as someone else's problem is building the exact silent period a hearing officer will later be asked to judge. The defensible practice is documented follow-up: dated attempts to reach the parent, offers to assist with the paperwork, and a record of each contact.
The end-of-year exception and how days are counted
Section 29.004(a-1) addresses consent that arrives near the end of the school year. If the district receives written consent at least 35 but fewer than 45 school days before the last instructional day, the evaluation report must be completed and provided to the parent not later than June 30 of that year, and the ARD committee must meet not later than the 15th school day of the following school year to consider it. Section 29.004(a-2) supplies the counting rule: days between the end of the spring term and the start of the fall term are not school days, so the clock effectively pauses over the summer.
Texas replaced the federal default, and made it shorter
The federal regulation, 34 C.F.R. § 300.301(c), gives districts 60 calendar days from consent to conduct the initial evaluation unless the state has established its own timeframe. Texas did. The 45-school-day rule is that state timeframe, and because it counts school days rather than calendar days, it behaves differently across the year: tighter than it sounds during an uninterrupted semester, and paused entirely over the summer. Staff trained on the federal 60-day number are trained on a rule that does not govern them.
The MTSS trap: intervention cannot gate a referral
Multi-tiered systems of support are a sound general education framework and a recurring Child Find liability. The failure mode is nearly always the same sentence, spoken in a campus meeting: let us run one more round of Tier 2 before we refer. Texas law forecloses that instinct directly. Section 89.1011 of Title 19 of the Administrative Code makes referral for an FIIE part of the district's multi-tiered system of supports, and then states that the district cannot require a student to participate in interventions or support services for any specific length of time before a referral is made or an FIIE is conducted. That is not an agency guidance letter. It is the commissioner's own rule, and it means intervention data can inform a referral decision but can never be a precondition to one.
The operational fix is procedural: make the MTSS team responsible for raising the Child Find question at every formal review, and document the answer. If the decision is not to refer, the file should say why, in writing, with a name attached. A student who has cycled through repeated rounds of intensive intervention without measurable progress is presumptively a trigger, and the single page explaining a decision not to evaluate is often the difference between a defensible file and an indefensible one.
HB 3928 changed the dyslexia pathway
For years, many Texas campuses ran dyslexia identification through a separate, lighter-weight process that never touched the special education office. House Bill 3928, passed by the 88th Legislature in 2023 and applicable beginning with the 2023-2024 school year, ended that arrangement. When a district suspects, or has reason to suspect, that a student may have dyslexia and may be a child with a disability under the IDEA, the district must provide the parent the FIIE paperwork, including the Overview of Special Education for Parents, and run the case through the standard evaluation pathway.
The bill also changed who sits at the table. The multidisciplinary team conducting the FIIE, and any ARD committee convened on eligibility, must include at least one member with specific knowledge of dyslexia, the reading process, and dyslexia instruction: a licensed dyslexia therapist, a holder of the most advanced dyslexia certification recognized by the Texas Education Agency, or, where neither is available, a person meeting training requirements set by the State Board of Education. The Dyslexia Handbook was amended to align, and dyslexia programming is now treated as specially designed instruction. A district still routing dyslexia referrals around its special education staff is not running a legacy process. It is running a non-compliant one, and every such referral is simultaneously a Child Find file.
What a miss costs: two forums, two limitation periods
A Child Find failure can be raised in two different forums, and they run on different clocks. Districts often prepare for one and get served with the other.
A state complaint to the Texas Education Agency under Section 89.1195 of Title 19 of the Administrative Code must allege a violation that occurred not more than one calendar year before TEA receives the complaint. TEA then generally has 60 calendar days to investigate and resolve it, extendable for exceptional circumstances or by agreement while the parties pursue mediation. It is fast, document-driven, and decided by the agency.
A due process hearing under Section 89.1151 runs on a longer and less forgiving clock. Since September 1, 2022, a parent or public education agency must request a hearing within two years of the date the party knew or should have known about the alleged action. The period used to be one year; House Bill 1252, passed by the 87th Legislature in 2021, doubled it, and a surprising amount of guidance still circulating in administrator trainings quotes the old number. The two-year window is also not a bright line measured from the miss itself. It is a knew-or-should-have-known standard, which means a Child Find failure from a prior school year can surface well after the staff who made the decision have moved on. The rule carries a tolling exception for parents serving on active military duty.
The same failure can generate both proceedings, on different timelines. That is the practical argument for building the file contemporaneously instead of reconstructing it after a complaint arrives.
Why identification rates draw state and federal attention
The history explains the scrutiny. In January 2018, the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Special Education Programs issued formal findings that Texas had failed to ensure children with disabilities were properly identified and evaluated, driven by a state monitoring indicator that had effectively pressured districts to hold special education identification near 8.5 percent of enrollment. TEA submitted a corrective action plan, and the indicator was eliminated. Senate Bill 139, passed by the 86th Legislature in 2019, grew directly out of that episode: it requires TEA to develop, and districts and open-enrollment charters to distribute, a plain-language notice to all families explaining a child's evaluation rights and how to initiate a referral, and the notice must disclose that the old 8.5 percent indicator is gone. A district whose internal practices still drift toward suppressing identification is recreating the exact fact pattern that produced a federal finding of noncompliance, and identification-rate questions now reach the boardroom as governance questions, the kind our board governance practice regularly fields.
What a defensible Child Find file looks like
A district defending a Child Find dispute has to demonstrate two things: that its general procedures were reasonable, and that it applied them to the specific student in good faith. The records that carry the second point are specific.
- Intervention data showing what was tried, for how long, and with what result, tied to dates.
- Teacher and counselor notes flagging concerns, the date they were raised, and what was decided in response.
- Parent communications, including the date a parent first raised a diagnosis, a struggle, or an evaluation request, and whether any request was in writing.
- Referral committee minutes showing the Child Find question was asked and answered at each formal review.
- For any decision not to refer, a written explanation of why, signed by the person who made it.
- Both timelines tracked separately: request to consent paperwork against the 15-school-day clock, and consent to completed report against the 45-school-day clock, with documented follow-up during any gap while a consent form sat unsigned.
If a district discovers it has already missed, the instinct is to defend the past. The better practice is usually to fix the present: evaluate now, determine eligibility now, make the offer of services now, and document the corrective action transparently. If a complaint or due process request has already been filed, the calculus changes, and counsel should be involved before any compensatory services are offered. Compensatory education is one of the most negotiable remedies in special education practice, and an unconditional pre-litigation offer is rarely the right opening position.
Frequently asked questions
What is Child Find under the IDEA?
Child Find is the affirmative duty under 20 U.S.C. § 1412(a)(3) and 34 C.F.R. § 300.111 requiring states and school districts to identify, locate, and evaluate all children with disabilities who may need special education services, including children who are homeless, wards of the state, or attending private school. The duty exists independent of any parent request.
What is the difference between the 15-school-day rule and the 45-school-day rule in Texas?
They are two separate clocks under Section 29.004 of the Education Code and 19 TAC Section 89.1011. The 15-school-day clock runs from a parent's written request for an evaluation to the district providing a consent opportunity or a written refusal with notice of procedural safeguards. The 45-school-day clock starts only when the district receives signed written consent, and it governs completion of the written evaluation report.
Can a Texas district require RTI or MTSS before evaluating a student?
No. 19 TAC Section 89.1011 states that a district cannot require a student to participate in interventions or support services for any specific length of time before a referral is made or a full individual and initial evaluation is conducted. Intervention data can support a referral decision, but it cannot be a precondition to one.
Does a parent's request have to be in writing to start the clock?
The 15-school-day statutory clock under Section 29.004(c) is tied to a written request. The broader Child Find duty is not. Under Krawietz v. Galveston Independent School District, the duty can be triggered by the district's own notice of facts or behavior likely to indicate a disability, with or without any request from a parent.
How long does a parent have to bring a due process claim over a Child Find failure?
Since September 1, 2022, generally two years from the date the party knew or should have known about the alleged action, under 19 TAC Section 89.1151(c). This replaced a prior one-year limitation. A separate state complaint to TEA must allege conduct within the prior calendar year.
Did Texas change how dyslexia evaluations work?
Yes. House Bill 3928 (2023) requires that where a district suspects dyslexia and a possible IDEA disability, the case proceed through the standard full individual and initial evaluation, with an evaluation team member holding specific dyslexia qualifications. It applies beginning with the 2023-2024 school year.
When to bring in counsel
Most Child Find questions resolve inside the district's own process. The ones that need counsel share a fact pattern: a parent's written request whose 15-school-day response window is close or already blown, a 45-school-day evaluation clock slipping toward the end of the year, a dyslexia referral still running outside the FIIE pathway, a pattern of disciplinary removals with no evaluation discussion anywhere in the file, or a demand reaching back into a prior school year under the two-year window. In each of those, the cost of guessing wrong is measured in hearings and corrective action, not in a phone call.
Maddox & Muñiz advises Texas districts across the full arc of these disputes, from Child Find audits and evaluation-timeline triage through ARD support, TEA complaint response, and due process defense, as part of our school law practice. If your district is looking at a specific student file, a specific clock, or a pattern it does not like, schedule a consultation and we will walk it through with you.
If your district wants a second set of eyes on a referral file or its evaluation timelines, the consultation is complimentary.
Schedule ConsultationThis article is general information about federal and Texas special education law, including the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, Section 29.004 of the Texas Education Code, and related commissioner's rules, and is not legal advice. It does not create an attorney-client relationship. Statutes, regulations, agency rules, and TEA guidance change, and evaluation timelines turn on district-specific facts; confirm current requirements with counsel before acting.
