Education records: what can a parent have access to?

Two different parents asked:
"I requested copy of my sons school records. Can I request copies of emails sent between staff members regarding my son ? If so , how do o request them ?"
and
"Good morning..... in NJ, what school records are the parents able to receive upon request?"

[@Ethanthegreat14]

Is there anything we can do in the event that the school cannot find any record of my son's 504 plans leading into his iep. I have emails where a staff member was supplying intervention to textbook dyslexia but they failed to identify and refuse to identify years later. I have an email to prove attempted intervention but the school cannot find it

[@AskASpecialEducationAttorney]

Is this your son's first IEP after having an unsuccessful 504 and/or RTI interventions? It sounds like all these attempts failed and you've been advocating for the IEP and finally got it and now you're trying to gather the necessary proof that their prior attempts failed in order to push for the right interventions and, potentially, push for remedial/compensatory services to make up for lost time. Is this correct?

[@Ethanthegreat14]

@@AskASpecialEducationAttorney Correct

[@AskASpecialEducationAttorney]

@@Ethanthegreat14 I thought so and it's not an uncommon strategy for a school to "lose" things that might be damaging to them and there isn't much you can do about that as a parent. The nice thing is that your son qualified for an IEP and the only real pressure on you on proving that your son should have been identified earlier is identifying the point in time when the school personnel knew, suspected or should have known that he had a disability and might require an IEP. Having the IEP is one huge marker and the other is when you first started advocating for him and they knew he had a disability/issues. As long as that's within that 2 year statute of limitations then this would be your justification to request remedial/compensatory services. I doubt that they would be able to point to measurable progress under the 504 or RTI process or he'd still be under those programs so that would help you. The information that you're looking for is beneficial but from a broader macro perspective it really comes down to what I explained above. When did they know, suspect or should have known that he should have been evaluated for an IEP?
What state are you in?

[@Ethanthegreat14]

@@AskASpecialEducationAttorney I'm in Texas.

[@AskASpecialEducationAttorney]

@@Ethanthegreat14 Ok. We have an office in Texas and I would have no issue reviewing the completed IEP and any other documentation to assist you in narrowing down what remedial/compensatory services would look like and what, if anything, you'd need. I'd also review the IEP to ensure that it's developed in the right way and according to his evaluation results. We generally do no charge families for our assistance if the situation that they are dealing with meets the recognized standard for involving an expert like myself... it's part of your rights and your child's rights under this law. Let me know if you'd like for me to do that and, if so, send us an email at [e-mail] and we can go from there.