How to Get the Most Out of Regional Center This Summer

When school’s out for the summer and your child is spending more time at home or in a summer program, Regional Center may be able to step in to offer more services and funding to ensure that your child (and you!) has the supports they need. However, you’ll have to do a little legwork to request the extra services or funding.

To help you get started and prepared for summer, we talked with our Public Benefits Specialist, Lisa Concoff Kronbeck. Her top piece of advice? Start the process with your Regional Center as soon as possible! It can take a month or more to work with your service coordinator and get everything in place, so start reaching out now.

Lisa says that parents who already receive respite and/or specialized supervision hours may be able to get those hours increased during the summer, but the important thing is to show Regional Center how the extra services would help you meet your child’s needs. For example, if both parents work full-time, they can request extra hours for day care or supervision during the summer when their child is not at school or ESY.

All Regional Centers handle hours a bit differently, so you’ll want to check the service standards on your local Regional Center’s website. However, summer supervision hours often amount to four hours for each weekday that school is not offered (excluding federal holidays), since district-funded ESY usually only covers a portion of the summer.

In order for Regional Center to fund your child’s summer camp or social-rec program, you’ll need to have goals written into their Individualized Program Plan (IPP) that support the need for the camp or program and establish that no appropriate generic resource is available. (For tips on how to write goals specifically for social-rec programs, read our article on Regional Center’s social-rec funding.) If these goals aren’t in place, be sure to request an IPP meeting to update the goals before you request funding for a summer program.

Once the IPP goals are in place, you need to make sure the camp or program you want is vendored with Regional Center. If you know a company is vendored with Regional Center and does summer programs, you can request funding. If you don’t have a specific program in mind, you can look at the list of providers or vendors on your Regional Center’s website to see what companies are already vendored.

Even though the state has restored Regional Center funding for social-recreational programs, some individual RCs still need to update their standards of service, so they may not yet have published their funding guidelines for these programs. If this is the case at your local RC, submit your request and talk to your service coordinator.

Many Regional Centers will have a set number of hours or days per week/month for camp or social-recreational programming, and this programming cannot overlap with generic resources. For example, a child cannot attend summer camp at the same time that they’re attending ESY, because this would be a duplication of services. However, funding is allocated separately between camp, social-rec, educational services, and nonmedical therapies, so parents should not be told they need to choose one over the others.  ​​​​​​​ Regional Center can provide funding for a 1:1 aide at camp in some circumstances, but you’ll have to check with the camp first to see if the camp will provide an aide. Lisa says that many Regional Centers have some kind of community inclusion aide in their service standards, so you may be able to request 1:1 aide services in order for your child to fully participate in the camp or program. If you are requesting a 1:1 behavioral aide, this request will need to be supported by the behavior plan.

The Regional Center is always the payer of last resort. Therefore, while Regional Center funding has been restored for educational services like tutoring and education therapy, you’ll still need to request these services from the school district first.

When it comes to getting additional ABA hours, your child will need an assessment to establish the need for more ABA hours, e.g., if they don’t do well with the schedule changes brought about by summer, or if being home from school provides the opportunity to introduce a toilet training regimen in the behavior plan, for example. It’s important to note that these hours will be based on the child’s need for additional service hours, not the parent’s needs. Sorry, you can’t use ABA hours for respite!

1. Review your child’s IPP and make sure it has goals that support requesting summer services. If it doesn’t, request an IPP meeting to update the goals.

2. Think about the additional supports your child will need over the summer, including social-emotional, recreational, and physical activity needs, among others. Also consider what supports you will need because of the change in schedule (e.g., respite or day care). Then, think about what generic services are available, like ESY, community summer programs, etc. What’s available to help you make sure you can meet all your child’s needs? Make a list of where Regional Center can step in to fill some of the gaps in support. This could include funding for things like camp, art classes, or respite care.

3. Call your service coordinator as soon as possible to submit your request. Don't wait — things can take a while!

4. Continue to follow up about once a week.

5. Once your request is approved, ask your service coordinator what the next steps are.

6. If your request for summer services is denied, read our article about how to appeal a denial.

You and your family can meet the extra challenges and opportunities of summertime by requesting Regional Center services to cover those needs. The important thing to remember is to get your request in early, and make sure that any funding request you make can be supported by the goals in your child’s IPP. You can also check out our article Frequently Asked Questions about Regional Center Summer Services.