Special-education help for New Mexico families.

New Mexico's Family Infant Toddler (FIT) Program — run by the Early Childhood Education & Care Department — gives free developmental evaluation and services (speech, occupational, physical, and developmental therapy) to any child birth to 3 with a delay or qualifying condition, anywhere in the state, delivered in your home. Services are always free regardless of income or immigration status. FIT is ranked among the top early-intervention systems in the nation and serves over 14,000 New Mexico children. This is the single best first call for a baby or toddler.

FIT is delivered by local provider agencies across all of New Mexico, including tribal communities. Use the ECECD FIT directory to find the agency serving your county, or call the FIT program to be connected. They come to you, in your home and community.

Parents Reaching Out is New Mexico's federally funded Parent Training and Information Center. It gives free, one-to-one help understanding your rights, the evaluation, and the IEP process — in English and Spanish, with deep experience serving rural, tribal, and immigrant families across the state. The staff are trained parent specialists who've been through it themselves. Call before you pay any private advocate.

EPICS (Education for Parents of Indian Children with Special Needs) is a New Mexico parent center focused on Native American families. It offers free guidance on evaluations, IEPs, and your rights, with cultural understanding of life on the Pueblos, Navajo Nation, and Apache lands — a vital resource if the school system feels far away.

Disability Rights New Mexico is the state's federally mandated protection & advocacy agency. It provides free legal information and advocacy when a child's special-education rights are being denied — including help with disputes, restraint/seclusion, discipline, and access to services. A powerful no-cost resource to know about before you ever hire a lawyer.

The New Mexico Division of Vocational Rehabilitation (DVR) provides free help for students with disabilities (starting as early as age 14) to prepare for work, college, and independent living — Pre-Employment Transition Services (Pre-ETS), counseling, training, and assistive technology. DVR counselors are assigned to public high schools across the state, including charter and tribal schools. Ask your DVR counselor to join your child's transition IEP meetings.

New Mexico's home- and community-based Medicaid waivers — the Developmental Disabilities (DD) Waiver, the Medically Fragile Waiver, and Mi Via (self-directed) — can pay for therapies, respite, nursing, and supports for a child with significant disabilities. Eligibility is based on the child's needs and, for the Medically Fragile Waiver, the child's income only — not the parents' income. The waiting lists run years long, so the single most important move is to get on every list TODAY. Call your Medicaid intake or the program manager to add your child's name now.

New Mexico does not offer a separate Katie Beckett/TEFRA pathway. Instead, the Medically Fragile Waiver counts only the child's income (so many middle-income families qualify), and for any child already on Medicaid, the EPSDT benefit covers medically necessary speech, OT, PT, and behavioral therapy — an immediate path to services while you wait on a waiver list. Get on the waiver interest lists AND apply for Medicaid now; do not wait for one to come through.

You can ask your school district in writing for a special-education evaluation at any time. Once you sign consent, New Mexico districts must complete the evaluation within 60 calendar days, and then — if your child is found eligible — hold an IEP meeting within 30 calendar days of the eligibility determination. Put the request in writing and date it; the clock starts when the district receives your signed consent. You have the right to everything in your language, to bring anyone to the meeting, and to disagree.

Under IDEA you have the right to a free, appropriate public education (FAPE), to a full evaluation at no cost, to be an equal member of the IEP team, to an Independent Educational Evaluation (IEE) if you disagree with the school's, and to dispute resolution (mediation, state complaint, or due process). NMPED publishes the Procedural Safeguards in English and Spanish, and your PTI above explains all of it for free.

The New Mexico Public Education Department's Special Education Bureau sets the rules every district must follow, runs the state complaint, mediation, and due-process systems, and publishes the New Mexico Dyslexia Handbook. State law requires a dyslexia screener for all first-grade students (within the first 40 days of instruction) and structured-literacy instruction. Start here to know exactly what the state requires of your school.

Use the ZIP finder to pull the nearest evaluators, therapists, and special-education schools to your address, plus your area's full directory — and these statewide free programs are always shown, no matter how rural or remote your town.

Several reputable practices provide autism/ADHD evaluation and speech/OT/ABA by telehealth across New Mexico — vital for families on the Navajo Nation, the Pueblos, and remote rural counties hours from a clinic. Nationally, COPAA (advocates/attorneys), the Academy of Orton-Gillingham (dyslexia), ABPP (board-certified evaluators), BHCOE (ABA), and Bookshare (free accessible books) round out your options.