July 20, 2026, U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) issued a resolution letter to Southeastern Cooperative Educational Programs (SECEP), concerning the use of seclusion with a student who has disabilities.
SECEP is a public regional special education program jointly overseen by eight Virginia school divisions: Virginia Beach City, Norfolk, Chesapeake, Portsmouth, Franklin City, Suffolk, Southampton County, and Isle of Wight County.
OCR styled the complaint as Case No. 11-19-1090. The complaint alleged that SECEP discriminated against the student based on disability when it secluded him during a redacted school year, denying him a free appropriate public education (FAPE).
Before OCR completed its investigation, SECEP expressed interest in voluntarily resolving the complaint. SECEP signed a resolution agreement with OCR on July 13, 2026.
The agreement states that it doesn’t “constitute an admission by SECEP of a violation of Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (Section 504), Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (Title II), or any other law enforced by OCR.”
The Timeline Is the Story
OCR was already examining SECEP’s use of restraint and seclusion under a separate systemic compliance review, OCR Case No. 11-17-5001.
OCR opened that review Aug. 29, 2017, to examine whether SECEP denied FAPE to students who had disabilities when it restrained or secluded them. It didn’t resolve the review until Dec. 16, 2022, more than five years later.
