Office for Civil Rights Publishes 52 More Findings and/or Resolutions for Disability Discrimination Cases
In the last 24 hours, OCR published findings and resolutions for 57 more cases resolved in 2024, of which 52 focus on disability discrimination.
Office for Civil Rights (OCR) published findings and resolutions for 57 more cases resolved in 2024.
In the last 24 hours, the total number of cases resolved in 2024 went up from 386 to 443, and the total number of disability discrimination cases went up from 280 to 332.
Important: Cases resolved in 2024 weren’t necessarily filed in 2024. For example, Case No. 09-14-1325 (against Fall River Joint Unified School District) was filed in 2014 and resolved a decade later, December 20, 2024. This holds true for cases resolved in earlier years and in 2025.
Another example: January 2025, OCR entered into a resolution agreement with Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS) for OCR Case No. 11-15-1335, which was filed in 2015. However, OCR didn’t publish its findings and agreement until August 8, 2025.
Quick Review
Between January and mid-July 2025, OCR failed to post a single disability discrimination resolution within the “Office for Civil Rights Recent Resolution Search” section on its site. The site listed just eight total investigations for 2025—and none addressed disability discrimination.
In early July—without fanfare or explanation—OCR updated its public resolution database, jumping from eight to 53 resolution listings, 35 of which address disability discrimination.
A few days later, the total rose again to 65 investigations, 47 of which focus on disability discrimination.
Two weeks of silence followed—and then OCR doubled the number of cases listed within the “Office for Civil Rights Recent Resolution Search” section on its site for 2025. The overall total for 2025 went from 65 to 123 cases published. The total for disability discrimination cases for 2025 went up from 35 to 76. In addition, the total number of cases from 2024 went from 380 to 386, and the total number of disability discrimination cases went from 277 to 280.
In the last 24 hours, the total number of cases resolved in 2024 went up from 386 to 443, and the total number of disability discrimination cases went up from 280 to 332.
The Good
OCR once again is publishing findings and resolution agreements.
The Bad
OCR still doesn’t issue press releases for every investigation finding or new resolution and letter upload, nor does the site include a “recently added” filter or any clear marker of what's new. This forces families and advocates into a daily scavenger hunt just to monitor federal enforcement of disability rights.
In addition, it means the institutions being investigated control the narrative, which has led to more problems.
For example, for OCR Case No. 11-15-1335 (mentioned above), a FOIA response filed in May 2025 resulted in FCPS releasing a heavily redacted version of OCR’s findings. However, when OCR published its redacted version of the findings, it was clear that FCPS over-redacted the findings and marked specific redactions as scholastic information, even though the content wasn’t scholastic information.
For example, in OCR’s LOF for OCR Case No. 11-15-1335, “consent decree” appears ten times (seven on page 12, one on page 15, two on page 16). FCPS redacted it in nine of those ten instances. The following is one example of how FCPS redacted “consent decree”:
On page 16, FCPS twice removed “consent decree” from a single paragraph, along with other litigation references, and replaced the redactions with “Scholastic Information.” The paragraph below is the one referenced, appearing on page 16. The words in bold are the ones FCPS redacted and replaced with “Scholastic Information”
“The policy also prohibited the use of seclusion in the CSS program beginning in January 2021, and the signed consent decree required the Division to eliminate all use of seclusion by the start of the 2022-2023 school year. Pursuant to the consent decree, the court will be monitoring the elimination of seclusion across the Division, including in the CSS program. OCR remains concerned, however, about the possible denial of FAPE and need for compensatory services for individual students in the [redacted content] program beginning in the [redacted content] school through December 2020. As noted above, the litigation expressly excluded FAPE allegations.”
In OCR’s own release, “CSS” was redacted both times it appears. Since FCPS did not redact “CSS” in this paragraph, those mentions are restored here for clarity.
This selective concealment undermines public trust and blocks informed discussion of systemic issues.
The Ugly
OCR is not publishing updates in chronological order. This suggests that there are more letters of finding and resolutions going back years.
There’s no way to tell which of the 2024 cases was most recently published. The only reason I know it went up is because 1) I graphed the yearly numbers a few months ago and 2) I checked yesterday morning to see if those numbers changed.
What’s New
In previous articles tracking published documents for 2025, I tracked the findings by dates added to OCR’s site. With 443 cases on OCR’s site for 2024, there’s a lot to sort through, so this first version of 2024 tracking will appear by state and will track disability discrimination only.
The number of findings and/or resolution agreements for each state, territory, and/or District of Columbia—as of the morning of August 12, 2025—are listed below.