Margda Pierre -Noel , “m S . Pierre ,” on Behalf of Her Minor Child K.n. v. Bridges Public Charter School and District of Columbia, A Municipal Corporation

United States Court of Appeals
FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT
Argued April 19, 2024 Decided September 3, 2024
No. 23-7057
M ARGDA PIERRE -NOEL , “M S . PIERRE ,” ON BEHALF OF HER
MINOR CHILD K.N.,
APPELLANT
v.
BRIDGES PUBLIC CHARTER SCHOOL AND DISTRICT OF
COLUMBIA, A M UNICIPAL CORPORATION,
APPELLEES
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the District of Columbia
(No. 1:23-cv-00070)
Charles A. Sibert argued the cause and filed the briefs for
appellant. Charles Moran entered an appearance.
Craig E. Leen was on the brief for amicus curiae Council
of Parent Attorneys and Advocates, Inc. in support of appellant.
Jeremy Girton, Assistant Attorney General, Office of the
Attorney General for the District of Columbia, argued the cause
for appellee District of Columbia. With him on the brief were
Brian L. Schwalb, Attorney General, Caroline S. Van Zile,
Solicitor General, Ashwin P. Phatak, Principal Deputy

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Solicitor General, and Thais-Lyn Trayer, Deputy Solicitor
General.
Lauren E. Baum argued the cause and filed the brief for
appellee Bridges Public Charter School.
Before: S RINIVASAN , Chief Judge, HENDERSON and RAO,
Circuit Judges.
Opinion for the Court filed by Chief Judge SRINIVASAN .
SRINIVASAN , Chief Judge: Congress enacted the
Individuals with Disabilities Education Act to ensure that
children with disabilities are not reflexively segregated from
their peers at school, or worse, unnecessarily stranded at home.
The IDEA offers states and the District of Columbia federal
funds in exchange for complying with various statutory
requirements. By accepting IDEA funds, a state commits to
provide every disabled student a “special education” tailored to
her needs, and to ensure that, to the greatest extent possible, she
receives that instruction alongside her peers. The IDEA also
requires states to provide certain “related services” if necessary
to enable a student to “benefit from” her special education.
Those “related services” include “transportation” services.
This appeal centrally concerns the extent of
“transportation” services that must be provided to K.N., an
eight-year-old boy living in the District of Columbia. Due to
multiple disabilities, K.N. has limitations in all areas of
functioning and depends on a wheelchair and other medical
devices. After attending school remotely from home in prior
school years, K.N. was set to join his first-grade classmates in
person.

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To that end, K.N.’s mother, Margda Pierre-Noel, asked the
District and his school to help move him from the door of their
apartment to the bus that would take him to school. Because
K.N. lives in an apartment building that lacks wheelchair
accessibility, getting K.N. from his apartment to a vehicle
requires transporting him across one or more sets of stairs. The
District denied Pierre-Noel’s request, citing its policy that
District staff retrieve students only from the outermost door of
their dwelling (here, the outside door of K.N.’s apartment
building), and in no event physically lift or carry students.
According to the District, the IDEA’s mandate to provide
“transportation” services requires nothing more.
The district court granted summary judgment in the
District’s favor, ruling that the service Pierre-Noel seeks for her
son is not a transportation service under the IDEA. We
disagree. In our view, the IDEA requires the District to move
K.N. between his apartment door and the vehicle that will take
him to and from school. Such door-to-door assistance is
encompassed by the District’s obligation to provide
transportation services. And in this case, the District concedes
that K.N. would require that assistance to be able to attend
school in person and benefit from his special education.
I.
A.
The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA),
20 U.S.C. § 1400 et seq., “represents an ambitious federal
effort to promote the education of handicapped children, and
was passed in response to Congress’[s] perception that a
majority of handicapped children in the United States ‘were
either totally excluded from schools or [were] sitting idly in
regular classrooms.’” Bd. of Educ. v. Rowley, 458 U.S. 176,
179 (1982) (second alteration in original) (quoting H.R. Rep.

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No. 94-332, at 2 (1975)). To remedy that problem, the IDEA
offers states and the District of Columbia federal funds to help
educate children with certain physical or intellectual
disabilities, and conditions that funding on “compliance with
extensive goals and procedures.” Id.
In accepting IDEA funds, states and the District agree to
provide eligible disabled children with a “free appropriate
public education,” or FAPE. See 20 U.S.C. § 1400(d)(1)(A).
A FAPE is the IDEA’s “core guarantee,” Fry v. Napoleon
Cmty. Schs., 580 U.S. 154, 158 (2017), and provides a disabled
child with both a “special education” and the “related services”
necessary for her to benefit from that special education, 20
U.S.C. § 1401(9), (26), (29). A student’s “special education”
is the “instruction” “specially designed . . . to meet [her]
unique needs.” Id. § 1401(29). Such instruction must be
provided “at no cost to parents,” and it can be “conducted in
the classroom, in the home, in hospitals and institutions, and in
other settings.” Id. “Related services” are the “transportation”
services and the “developmental, corrective, and other
supportive services” that “may be required to assist a
child . . . to benefit from [her] special education.” Id.
§ 1401(26)(A).
The scope of those related services—and in particular the
meaning of “transportation”—is the core issue in this case. The
IDEA does not define “transportation,” and only defines
“developmental, corrective, and other supportive services”
through a long parenthetical list of examples. See id.; infra pp.
15–16.
The provision of a FAPE must be “in conformity with the
[child’s] individualized education program,” or IEP. Id.
§ 1401(9)(D); see id. § 1414(d)(2). An IEP “is the means by
which special education and related services are tailored to the

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unique needs of a particular child.” Endrew F. ex rel. Joseph
F. v. Douglas Cnty. Sch. Dist. RE-1, 580 U.S. 386, 391 (2017)
(quotation marks omitted) (quoting Rowley, 458 U.S. at 181).
An IEP must be in place for each disabled student “[a]t the
beginning of each school year,” and must outline a
comprehensive plan to meet the child’s “educational needs.”
20 U.S.C. § 1414(d)(1)(A)(i)(II), (d)(2)(A).
Importantly, the IDEA provides that a state is eligible for
funding only if, among other things, it has “in effect policies
and procedures to ensure that” students are educated in the
“[l]east restrictive environment.” Id. § 1412(a)(5). That means
that, “[t]o the maximum extent appropriate,” disabled children
must be educated alongside their peers and can be removed
“from the regular educational environment . . . only when”
they cannot be “satisfactorily” educated “in regular classes
with the use of supplementary aids and services.” Id.
§ 1412(a)(5)(A); see also 34 C.F.R. §§ 300.114–300.120.
B.
K.N. is an eight-year-old boy living in the District of
Columbia. Due to multiple disabilities, including spastic
quadriplegic cerebral palsy, K.N. is nonverbal and faces
limitations in all areas of functioning. He depends on a
wheelchair to move, a tracheostomy tube to breathe, and a
gastronomy tube to eat and take medication because he cannot
swallow on his own through his mouth. Considered medically
fragile, K.N. requires one-on-one assistance from a nurse, as
well as leg and feet braces, elbow and hand splints, a body suit,
a pulse oximeter, and a suction machine.
K.N. attended Bridges Public Charter School remotely
from home during the 2020–2021 and 2021–2022 school years
due to the COVID-19 pandemic and his medical conditions. In
May 2022, Pierre-Noel and school staff met and updated K.N’s

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IEP to provide that he would attend school in person when
entering first grade that fall. The IEP established that K.N.’s
least restrictive learning environment was specialized
instruction with a dedicated nurse aide in school but outside of
the general education setting.
Because K.N. would be attending Bridges in person, his
IEP specified that he would require transportation in a bus with
a dedicated nurse to monitor his medical equipment. Pierre-
Noel subsequently requested a nurse and an aide who would
help K.N. not just while on the bus, but who could also move
him from the door of his apartment to the bus (and vice versa).
Doing so would require carrying K.N. up and down one or
more sets of stairs: to access K.N.’s non-wheelchair-accessible
apartment from the front door of the apartment building, one
must climb fourteen steps outside the building and descend six
steps inside it; to do so through the back door of the building,
one must climb fourteen interior steps. When K.N. was
younger, home-care nurses carried him down the back stairs to
get him to the school bus, but he is now too heavy for them to
lift. As for Pierre-Noel herself, she cannot carry K.N. because
of a medical condition, and her husband is not home to carry
K.N. on three of five weekdays because of his job
responsibilities. According to Pierre-Noel, moreover, K.N. has
a tendency to squirm and hyperextend his back when carried
outside his wheelchair.
The District’s educational agency, the Office of the State
Superintendent of Education (OSSE), has assumed the
statutory obligation to provide “transportation” services to
disabled students in the District. D.C. Code § 38-2907(a). In
response to Pierre-Noel’s request for assistance with carrying
K.N. from their apartment to the bus, an OSSE representative
told her that District employees could not enter their apartment
building or carry K.N.

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The District cited safety concerns and OSSE policy that
purports to limit the extent of transportation services the
District will provide. That policy states that OSSE bus drivers
and attendants “will utilize lifts, ramps, or other mechanized
equipment to assist students with wheelchairs,” but “are not
responsible for providing physical assistance to student
passengers” beyond “occasional non-intrusive assistance that
does not require lifting or carrying the student.” D.C. Off. of
the State Superintendent of Educ., Special Education
Transportation Policy at 8 (Nov. 6, 2013),
https://perma.cc/4H75-RWM8. The District, moreover,
maintains that students eligible for school-bus services will
only “be picked up from the outermost door of [their]
residence,” meaning OSSE drivers and attendants will not enter
any “apartment buildings, lobbies, entryways or alleys.” D.C.
Off. of the State Superintendent of Educ., Student
Transportation Family Handbook: 2023–24 School Year at 4,
5 (2023), https://perma.cc/GY82-56PG. Although Bridges
amended K.N.’s IEP to specify that he needed the services
sought by Pierre-Noel, the District maintained its refusal.
Pierre-Noel then pursued administrative relief. As the
IDEA prescribes, she filed a complaint with OSSE, and the
matter was adjudicated by a hearing officer in what the statute
terms a “due process hearing.” See 20 U.S.C. § 1415(b)(6),
(f)(1)(A), (f)(3)(A). Pierre-Noel’s complaint charged that the
District and Bridges had denied K.N. a FAPE by refusing to
transport K.N. pursuant to the transportation accommodations
outlined in his amended IEP. The hearing officer concluded it
was beyond his authority to order OSSE to transport K.N. as
Pierre-Noel requested, but he ordered OSSE to offer K.N.
transportation services to and from the outer door of K.N.’s
apartment building.

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As the IDEA permits, Pierre-Noel brought this suit seeking
review of the hearing officer’s determination. See 20 U.S.C.
§ 1415(i)(2)(A). She asked the district court to determine that
the IDEA requires either Bridges or the District to get K.N.
from his apartment door to school and vice versa because doing
so is a “transportation” service or a “supportive service” under
the statute; to order them to perform that service; and to declare
that in refusing to do so, they were denying K.N. a FAPE. See
Complaint at 24 (J.A. 503); Pierre-Noel ex rel. K.N. v. Bridges
Pub. Charter Sch., 660 F. Supp. 3d 29, 32, 37, 44 (D.D.C.
2023). The court held a hearing in which Pierre-Noel presented
as a witness the operations officer of a local transportation
company. He testified that he was familiar with K.N.’s medical
condition and the layout of K.N.’s apartment building, and that
his porters could safely transport K.N. between K.N.’s
apartment door and a vehicle outside.
The district court held that moving K.N. between the door
of his apartment and the bus is neither a “transportation”
service nor a “supportive service” under the IDEA. Pierre-
Noel, 660 F. Supp. 3d at 37–47. The court thus granted the
District summary judgment on whether it is obligated to
perform the transportation service outlined in K.N.’s amended
IEP. See id. at 47, 50. Pierre-Noel now appeals.
II.
Pierre-Noel contends that the IDEA requires either the
District or Bridges to move K.N. from the door of his apartment
to the school bus and back because doing so (i) is a
“transportation” service or “supportive service” and (ii) is
“required to assist” K.N. “to benefit from” the “special
education” to which he is entitled. See 20 U.S.C.
§ 1401(26)(A). The District disputes that moving K.N. from
his apartment to the school bus is a “transportation” service or

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“supportive service” under the IDEA. But the District
concedes that, if “transportation” service or “supportive
service” encompasses the assistance Pierre-Noel requests, that
service is “required to assist” K.N. to “benefit from special
education” within the meaning of the statute. Id.
We conclude that the IDEA’s provision for
“transportation” service obligates the District to transport K.N.
from his apartment door to the school bus. We thus do not
address whether that service also qualifies as a “supportive
service.” Before addressing the merits of the dispute, however,
we first explain why this appeal is moot as to Bridges but
otherwise remains justiciable.
A.
K.N. is no longer enrolled at Bridges School. Pierre-Noel
withdrew K.N. from Bridges at the start of the 2023–2024
school year. Pierre-Noel placed K.N. in a private school for a
period of time, but then re-enrolled K.N. in the District of
Columbia Public School system. Upon K.N.’s re-enrollment,
the District reiterated to Pierre-Noel that it would not transport
K.N. from his apartment door to the school bus.
In light of those developments, this appeal is moot as to
Bridges. “Under Article III of the Constitution,” federal courts
have jurisdiction only to “adjudicate actual, ongoing
controversies.” Honig v. Doe, 484 U.S. 305, 317 (1988)
(emphasis added). And there is no ongoing controversy
between Bridges and K.N.: he no longer attends that school,
and Pierre-Noel has not made any representations that she
plans to re-enroll him there.
There remains a justiciable controversy between K.N. and
the District, however, because this case presents an issue that
is capable of repetition but evading review. That exception to

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mootness applies if “(1) the challenged action was in its
duration too short to be fully litigated prior to its cessation or
expiration, and (2) there was a reasonable expectation that the
same complaining party would be subjected to the same action
again.” J.T. v. District of Columbia, 983 F.3d 516, 523 (D.C.
Cir. 2020) (citation omitted). Both conditions are met here.
IDEA cases often satisfy the “evading review” prong
because, while they can take years to make their way through
the statute’s “ponderous” administrative and judicial review
process, they typically involve challenges to decisions or IEPs
in effect only for a school year or less. District of Columbia v.
Doe, 611 F.3d 888, 895 (D.C. Cir. 2010) (quoting Honig, 484
U.S. at 322); see, e.g., J.T., 983 F.3d at 523–24; Jenkins v.
Squillacote, 935 F.2d 303, 307–08 (D.C. Cir. 1991). For
instance, Pierre-Noel challenges the District’s refusal to
transport K.N. in the manner she requests, but the specific
action she challenges was timebound: it was a refusal to
provide the services outlined in K.N.’s amended IEP. See
supra p. 7. As is typically the case, see 20 U.S.C.
§ 1414(d)(4)(A), (d)(5), that IEP was in effect for the then-
upcoming school year but has now been replaced by a new IEP.
An IEP-based challenge thus ordinarily cannot “be fully
litigated prior to” the IEP’s “expiration.” J.T., 983 F.3d at 524.
This dispute also satisfies the “capable of repetition”
prong. To meet that prong, there must be a “reasonable degree
of likelihood” that the complained-of “wrong”—defined “in
terms of the legal questions it presents for decision”—“will be
the basis of a continuing controversy between the two parties.”
Id. at 524 (citations and brackets omitted). Here, K.N. does not
bring a “fact-specific challenge to particular provisions in an
inoperative IEP.” Id. at 519. Instead, he raises a legal question:
whether “related services” under the IDEA encompass moving
him from his apartment door to the school bus. And it is

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reasonably likely that question would be the source of future
litigation between the parties: K.N. is re-enrolled in a District
public school, the “nature of his disabilit[ies]” means K.N.
likely will continue to request the same assistance from the
District, and the District presumably will continue to “insist[]”
it has no obligation to provide that assistance. Honig, 484 U.S.
at 318–19. As a result, the legal issue will likely—if not
certainly—arise when his new IEP is prepared. See Jenkins,
935 F.2d at 308.
For those reasons, while this challenge is moot as to
Bridges, it remains justiciable as to the District.
B.
We turn now to the central question before us: whether
the door-to-door assistance Pierre-Noel requests on behalf of
K.N. qualifies as a “transportation” service under the IDEA.
We conclude that transportation service includes moving K.N.
between the door of his apartment and the vehicle that will
transport him to and from school.
1.
We consider at the outset the extent to which Spending
Clause principles of “clear notice” affect our analysis. Those
principles, according to the District, mean that the IDEA can
be read to encompass moving K.N. from his apartment door to
the school bus only if that result is unambiguously clear. We
are unpersuaded.
In Arlington Central School District Board of Education
v. Murphy, 548 U.S. 291, 295–96 (2006), the Supreme Court
reiterated the implications of the IDEA’s status as Spending
Clause legislation. Because of that status, the Court explained,
states must have “clear notice” of any obligations they incur if

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they accept IDEA funds. Id. “Unlike ordinary legislation,
which imposes congressional policy on regulated parties
involuntarily, Spending Clause legislation operates based on
consent: in return for federal funds, the recipients agree to
comply with federally imposed conditions.” Cummings v.
Premier Rehab Keller, P.L.L.C., 596 U.S. 212, 219 (2022)
(cleaned up) (quoting Pennhurst State Sch. & Hosp. v.
Halderman, 451 U.S. 1, 16, 17 (1981)). That dynamic means
that Spending Clause legislation operates “much in the nature
of a contract.” Pennhurst, 451 U.S. at 17. The “legitimacy” of
such legislation “thus rests on whether [a] State voluntarily and
knowingly accepts the terms of the ‘contract,’” i.e., the
enforceable obligations that come with acceptance of federal
funds. Id. And because states “cannot knowingly accept
conditions of which they are unaware or which they are unable
to ascertain,” any such conditions “must be set out
unambiguously.” Murphy, 548 U.S. at 296 (internal quotation
marks and citation omitted).
In light of that clear-notice requirement, the District
argues, it would not be enough to conclude that
“transportation” is best read to encompass the assistance sought
by Pierre-Noel. That argument misconceives the salience of
the clear-notice principle in this case. True, the IDEA must
make clear to states that they incur an obligation to provide
transportation services as a condition of accepting IDEA funds.
The precise scope of that obligation, however, need not be
spelled out to an extent specifying every factual scenario in
which it will apply. See Mayweathers v. Newland, 314 F.3d
1062, 1067 (9th Cir. 2002); cf. Bennett v. Ky. Dep’t of Educ.,
470 U.S. 656, 662, 665–66 (1985); Davis ex rel. LaShonda D.
v. Monroe Cnty. Bd. of Educ., 526 U.S. 629, 649–50 (1999).
Rather, for purposes of ascertaining whether a state has “clear
notice” that it will incur an obligation if it accepts federal funds,

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the “crucial inquiry” is whether “the State could make an
informed choice.” Pennhurst, 451 U.S. at 25.
Here, then, the liability a state must “voluntarily and
knowingly” accept, id. at 17, is the requirement to provide
transportation services; there is no additional requirement that
the state know of every scenario encompassed by the
obligation. On that understanding, the IDEA supplies ample
notice. No one disputes that the requirement to provide
“transportation” services to disabled students is an
unambiguous condition of receiving IDEA funds: the IDEA
conditions a state’s funding eligibility on providing a FAPE to
“all children with disabilities residing in” its borders, 20 U.S.C.
§ 1412(a)(1)(A), and the statute defines a FAPE to include
“transportation” services, id. § 1401(9), (26). That there may
be some uncertainty about the extent of the transportation
obligation does not bear on whether the District made an
“informed choice” to assume it. See Pennhurst, 451 U.S. at 25.
So, to conclude that the IDEA requires the District to transport
K.N. in the door-to-door manner Pierre-Noel requests, we need
only apply ordinary tools of statutory construction to determine
that the mandate to provide “transportation” services is best
read to cover the requested assistance.
2.
When denying the transportation request outlined in
K.N.’s amended IEP, the District cited its policy that bus staff
cannot go farther than the outermost door of a building and
cannot carry students. The IDEA requires nothing more,
according to the District, because “transportation” service
under the statute “primarily means conveying schoolchildren
to and from schools using vehicles like school buses.” DC Br.
17; see also id. at 21, 25–26. That vehicle-based
understanding, to the District, means the IDEA requires it to

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provide only vehicular transport (busing) and immediate,
vehicle-adjacent assistance (such as “ramps to assist students
with disabilities” to board a bus). Id. at 2. In the District’s
view, accordingly, even its policy of helping a disabled student
move from the outermost door of his building to the bus (as
long as there is no need to carry the student) goes beyond the
vehicle-centered duty imposed by the statute. Aside from its
claim that “transportation” under the IDEA is vehicle-centric,
the District presents no other argument for why
“transportation” services would not encompass the door-to-
door assistance Pierre-Noel requests.
Under the District’s reading, providing “transportation”
service for a disabled student to attend school would only
include travel in a vehicle and immediate assistance with
boarding the vehicle, but would not encompass getting the
student to the vehicle from his home. The logic of that position
would seem to mean that, in a school district that provides bus
service to and from bus stops rather than individual homes, the
obligation to provide “transportation” service to a disabled
student would include picking her up and dropping her off at a
bus stop (and assisting her with getting on and off the bus at
the stop), but would not encompass getting her from her home
to the bus stop (and vice versa).
The District’s interpretation of “transportation” service is
unduly narrow. The statute, as noted, does not define the term
“transportation.” Absent a statutory definition, we typically
interpret a statutory term according to its “ordinary,
contemporary, common meaning.” Sw. Airlines Co. v. Saxon,
596 U.S. 450, 455 (2022) (quoting Sandifer v. U.S. Steel Corp.,
571 U.S. 220, 227 (2014)). While dictionaries can often help
identify a term’s ordinary meaning, they offer limited
assistance here. Dictionaries around the time of the IDEA’s
enactment in 1975 do not universally indicate that

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transportation is confined to the vehicle-based limitation
envisioned by the District.
The 1968 version of Black’s Law Dictionary defined
“transportation” as “[t]he removal of goods or persons from
one place to another, by a carrier,” Transportation, BLACK’ S
LAW DICTIONARY (4th ed. 1968), but it defined “transport”
more broadly as “[t]o carry or convey from one place to
another,” Transport, id. The next edition of Black’s Law
Dictionary, released in 1979, contained the same definition of
“transport,” but adjusted “transportation” slightly: “The
movement of goods or persons from one place to another, by a
carrier.” Transportation, BLACK’ S LAW DICTIONARY (5th ed.
1979) (emphasis added). Other legal and lay dictionaries from
the same period offered similar definitions, suggesting that
transportation sometimes—but not always—involves a vehicle
or carrier. See, e.g., Transport, BALLENTINE ’ S LAW
DICTIONARY (3rd ed. 1969) (“To carry from one place to
another. To convey, as by truck, train, ship, wagon, cart, etc.”);
Transportation, id. (“The carriage of persons or property from
one point to another.”); Transport, OXFORD AMERICAN
HERITAGE DICTIONARY (1976) (“To carry from one place to
another; convey.”); Transportation, id. (“The act of
transporting.”). While the focus on a vehicle is perhaps more
pronounced in entries for the noun (“transportation”) than the
verb (“transport”), that is far from dispositive.
That is especially so because we must consider the term
“transportation” not in isolation, but in its context in the statute.
The term “transportation” appears in a provision defining the
“related services” that a state must provide to disabled students:
The term ‘related services’ means
transportation, and such developmental,
corrective, and other supportive services

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(including speech-language pathology and
audiology services, interpreting services,
psychological services, physical and
occupational therapy, recreation, including
therapeutic recreation, social work services,
school nurse services designed to enable a child
with a disability to receive a free appropriate
public education as described in the
individualized education program of the child,
counseling services, including rehabilitation
counseling, orientation and mobility services,
and medical services, except that such medical
services shall be for diagnostic and evaluation
purposes only) as may be required to assist a
child with a disability to benefit from special
education.
20 U.S.C. § 1401(26)(A). In short, states must provide
“transportation . . . as may be required to assist a child with a
disability to benefit from special education.” Id.
The IDEA thus does not say states must offer students
“transportation,” full stop. Instead, the statute obligates states
to provide transportation as a related service to disabled
children to enable them “to benefit from special education.” Id.
And it groups “transportation” services of that kind with
“developmental, corrective, and other supportive services.” Id.
The latter—e.g., speech pathology services, counseling,
physical therapy—are naturally tailored to a particular child’s
individual needs. That the statute links transportation with
those bespoke services suggests that Congress likewise
intended transportation services to be comprehensive and
dependent on the unique needs of a specific child. It suggests,
then, that the transportation-service obligation can involve the

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kind of door-to-door service sought by Pierre-Noel when
needed to get a child to the site of her special education.
So, too, does the fact that “transportation” is modified only
by the phrase “as may be required to assist a child . . . to benefit
from special education.” Id. Congress could have specified
that the transportation obligation is essentially or exclusively
vehicular. Congress did exactly that in the Americans with
Disabilities Act, which defines “public school transportation”
as “transportation by schoolbus vehicles.” 42 U.S.C.
§ 12141(5). That Congress included no such language in the
IDEA is notable given that the laws involve closely related
contexts. See Wis. Cent. Ltd. v. United States, 585 U.S. 274,
279 (2018); United States v. Ressam, 553 U.S. 272, 276–77
(2008). Indeed, the Congress that enacted the ADA
reauthorized the IDEA a few months later without adjusting the
meaning of “transportation” (even as it adjusted the definition
of other terms in the IDEA). See Americans with Disabilities
Act, § 221, Pub. L. No. 101-336, 104 Stat. 327, 339 (1990);
Education of the Handicapped Act Amendments of 1990,
§ 101, Pub. L. No. 101-476, 104 Stat. 1103, 1103; see also INS
v. Cardoza-Fonseca, 480 U.S. 421, 432 (1987).
In arguing that its transportation-service obligation should
be read to contain a vehicular limitation even though the
provision nowhere mentions vehicles, the District submits that
its obligation cannot mean a “limitless burden of overcoming
every obstacle in the student’s path, even those created by the
family’s decision to live in a remote or inaccessible home.” DC
Br. 27. Whatever may be the extent of the requirement to
provide transportation services in circumstances not before us,
however, this case involves a child who lives in a walk-up
apartment accessible by stairs, an everyday occurrence that
hardly would have fallen outside Congress’s expectations in
enacting the IDEA.

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The statutory scheme in fact cuts against any notion that
Congress intended the narrow conception of “transportation”
pressed by the District. Transportation services enable a
disabled child to “benefit from special education,” 20 U.S.C.
§ 1401(26)(A); and the IDEA defines “special education” as
“specially designed instruction” (“to meet the unique needs of
a child”) not just “in the classroom” but also “in the home, in
hospitals and institutions, and in other settings,” id. § 1401(29).
In establishing that special education can take place in myriad
locations—indeed, in whatever “setting[]” is necessary “to
meet the unique needs of [the] child,” id.—Congress
envisioned that, to “benefit from special education,” id.
§ 1401(26), a disabled student might need to move between
and within multiple sites and kinds of facilities, not all of which
will facilitate easy pick up in (and drop off from) a school bus.
Much of that varied movement would be left unfacilitated,
however, if “transportation” were defined as narrowly as the
District urges. If that were so, the scope of the IDEA’s
transportation-service obligation would stand at odds with the
reach of the special-education provision. Cf. Parker Drilling
Mgmt. Servs. v. Newton, 587 U.S. 601, 608–09 (2019).
The IDEA also mandates that disabled students be
educated in the “[l]east restrictive environment.” 20 U.S.C.
§ 1412(a)(5)(A). The statute, as noted, requires states to ensure
that:
[t]o the maximum extent appropriate, children
with disabilities . . . are educated with children
who are not disabled, and special classes,
separate schooling, or other removal of children
with disabilities from the regular educational
environment occurs only when the nature or
severity of the disability of a child is such that
education in regular classes with the use of

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supplementary aids and services cannot be
achieved satisfactorily.
Id. That command to “mainstream” disabled students is a
central feature of the IDEA’s design. See Honig, 484 U.S. at
310–11 & n.1. We cannot assume that Congress desired for
disabled students to be educated in their least restrictive
learning environment to the maximum extent their abilities
permit, see 20 U.S.C. § 1412(a)(5)(A), but imposed a limited
transportation obligation that would foreseeably leave disabled
students without a way to access that very environment.
In that regard, adopting the District’s limited conception
of “transportation” services would “create some tension with
the purposes of the IDEA.” Garrett F., 526 U.S. at 77.
Congress enacted the IDEA in part to ensure that disabled
students previously excluded from the public school system
and stranded at home could instead attend school. See Rowley,
458 U.S. at 189; see also 20 U.S.C. § 1400(c)(2). In particular,
the IDEA “makes specific provision for services, like
transportation,” to “enable a child to be physically present in
class.” Irving Indep. Sch. Dist. v. Tatro, 468 U.S. 883, 891
(1984). The narrow interpretation of “transportation” urged by
the District would leave some disabled children unable to leave
their homes and join their classmates in school. K.N. is such a
student.
In sum, the IDEA’s terms, scheme, and purpose indicate
that “transportation” services include the door-to-door
assistance sought by Pierre-Noel for K.N. The District’s
contention that “transportation” connotes only vehicular
movement is unpersuasive, and the District offers no other
reason to conclude that transportation services exclude what
Pierre-Noel requests. The service she seeks—moving K.N.
from their apartment to the vehicle that will take him to

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school—fits within the scope of transportation services that
must be provided to disabled students.
3.
As the IDEA contemplates, the Department of Education
has issued a regulation interpreting and expounding on the
“related services” required by the statute. 20 U.S.C. § 1406(a);
34 C.F.R. § 300.34. The District contends that the
Department’s regulation contemplates that “transportation”
under the IDEA means essentially vehicular travel and
immediately adjacent assistance. That contention misses the
mark twice over. As an initial matter, the Department’s
regulations could not narrow the operative meaning of
“transportation” envisioned by the statute, Env’t Def. Fund v.
EPA, 922 F.3d 446, 457 (D.C. Cir. 2019), which, as just
explained, is broader than the vehicle-centric scope urged by
the District. And, regardless, we disagree with the District’s
interpretation of the relevant regulation.
That regulation generally addresses the scope of “related
services” encompassed by the IDEA, and a subsection
specifically addressed to transportation provides that
“[t]ransportation includes”:
(i) Travel to and from school and between
schools;
(ii) Travel in and around school buildings; and
(iii) Specialized equipment (such as special or
adapted buses, lifts, and ramps), if required to
provide special transportation for a child with a
disability.
34 C.F.R. § 300.34(c)(16).

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We read that subsection to encompass the kind of service
Pierre-Noel requests. Under the first prong, “[t]ravel to and
from school” can naturally include something more than just
pickup and drop-off at the curb, depending on a child’s needs.
And the second prong undercuts the District’s interpretation
that transportation is primarily vehicular: “[t]ravel in and
around school buildings,” id. (emphasis added), will often be
accomplished through non-vehicular means—for example,
manually pushing a wheelchair around the school campus.
The Department itself at one time espoused the
understanding that the regulation encompasses door-to-door
assistance. In 2006, after notice and comment, the Department
made various changes to the statute’s implementing
regulations. Service Obligations Under Special Education, 71
Fed. Reg. 32396 (July 5, 2006). When explaining the changes,
the Department noted that some commenters requested that the
regulation “explicitly define transportation as door-to-door
services, including provisions for an aide to escort the child to
and from the bus each day.” Assistance to States for the
Education of Children with Disabilities and Preschool Grants
for Children with Disabilities, 71 Fed. Reg. 46540, 46576
(Aug. 14, 2006). The Department declined to make that change
because, in its view, the regulatory definition of transportation
already was “sufficiently broad to address” that concern. See
id.
C.
Having concluded that the door-to-door assistance Pierre-
Noel requests fits within the scope of “transportation” services
mandated by the IDEA, we proceed to address two follow-on
questions. First, is K.N. in fact entitled to that service because
it is “required” for him “to benefit from [his] special
education”? 20 U.S.C. § 1401(26)(A). And second, if he is so

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entitled, does the obligation to provide the service rest with the
District or instead with his school?
The IDEA calls for a state to provide a student with
transportation services only to the degree the services “may be
required to assist [the] child . . . to benefit from special
education.” Id. Here, the District concedes that the requested
service is “required” within the meaning of the statute. While
maintaining that it will be appropriate in some cases to inquire
into whether the requested service is indeed necessary, the
District concedes that, if the assistance K.N. requests is a
“transportation” service under the IDEA, then that service is
necessary for K.N. to benefit from his special education. We
have no occasion to undertake the inquiry in light of the
District’s concession, and we leave for another day an
examination of what a student might need to show to establish
she requires the service in question.
Turning to the second question, the obligation to provide
the transportation service K.N. requires falls on the District, not
his school. Recall that the District has assumed the
responsibility to provide IDEA-mandated “transportation”
services. D.C. Code §§ 38-2901(12), 38-2907(a). The District
contends, however, that it retains discretion to provide
statutorily obligated services only to the degree it deems
appropriate. That position rests on a misreading of the IDEA’s
operative provision.
The relevant provision states that, when a “[s]tate
educational agency” (here, OSSE) assumes responsibility for
“provid[ing] . . . related services directly to children,” that
agency may provide . . . [the] related
services . . . in such manner and at such
locations . . . as [it] considers appropriate. Such

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education and services shall be provided in
accordance with this subchapter.
20 U.S.C. § 1413(g)(1), (2) (emphasis added). The District
submits that the phrase “as the State educational agency
considers appropriate,” id., means that it need not provide a
service if it believes it cannot do so in a way it considers
appropriate. That is incorrect. As the language emphasized
above confirms, states have some discretion in determining
how to deliver required services but do not have discretion to
decline to provide required services in the first place.
In sum, the IDEA entitles K.N. to be transported from his
apartment to the vehicle that will take him to school, and, by
assuming the responsibility to provide transportation services
under the statute, the District must perform that task. Insofar
as the district court on remand determines that injunctive relief
is appropriate, we clarify one aspect of our decision. Until
now, the parties have suggested that moving K.N. between his
apartment and the vehicle would require physically lifting and
carrying him. The District, though, could fulfill its statutory
obligation in a “manner” it “considers appropriate.” 20 U.S.C.
§ 1413(g)(2); see, e.g., 34 C.F.R. § 300.34(c)(16)(iii)
(providing that transportation under the IDEA includes use of
“lifts” and “ramps”).
* * * * *
For the foregoing reasons, we dismiss as moot the appeal
with respect to Bridges Public Charter School. We otherwise
vacate the district court’s grant of summary judgment and
remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
So ordered.

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