Legal Update for Special Education Law – Case Law Update

Third Circuit Upholds Award of Attorneys’ Fees Despite Student’s Loss Before Administrative Law Judge

Augustyn v. Wall Twp. Bd. of Educ., No. 23-3156, 2025 WL 1352259 (3d Cir. May 9, 2025)

The student was unsuccessful before the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) on the student’s petition for due process, which dismissed without a due process hearing the student’s claim that by neglecting to revise her grades in light of later completed work, the township board of education failed to provide the student with a free and appropriate public education (FAPE) as required by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). 

After reversal, granting summary judgment in favor of the student, the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey, James B. Day, United States Magistrate Judge, granted the student’s motion for attorneys’ fees. The township board of education appealed the fee award on its face, arguing that there should have been no award in the first place because the student was not a prevailing party.

The Third Circuit upheld the award for fees, holding that the fact that the student was unsuccessful in the proceeding before the ALJ did not justify denying attorneys’ fees the student incurred during those proceedings, following reversal of the ALJ’s determination that the student was not entitled to a due process hearing on her FAPE claim. The student was seeking to exercise a procedural statutory right as a necessary precursor to vindication of a substantive statutory right, and the student’s efforts to avoid dismissal by the ALJ had everything to do with relief obtained on appeal. Because the student’s arguments against dismissal were vindicated on appeal, the work required to make those arguments was deemed compensable. 

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