Special education and Section 504 advocates for Miami-Dade County Public Schools families in Miami.
3 based in Florida · 3 virtual advocates who work with Florida schools
An advocate is a paid professional who reads the evaluation reports, drafts your concerns, sits beside you at the IEP table, and follows up on whatever the school agreed to do.
Parents in Miami usually start looking for an advocate when a meeting is already on the calendar.
Before the meeting an advocate reads the current IEP against the evaluation reports, pulls the progress data to see whether the goals are actually being met, writes your concerns into one page, and sends it to the team in advance.
Miami-Dade County Public Schools keeps progress data on every goal in the plan. Ask for it as a table of dates and numbers rather than a paragraph.
No advocate in this directory lists Miami as their home base. These advocates work from other parts of Florida, and each card names the city.
Based in Wesley Chapel, FL
Special Education Advocate
With 24 years of experience in the K-12 sector, I serves as a Student Support Specialist specializing in academic and behavioral ESE services.
Based in Leesburg, FL
CEO IEP Advocate Espanol
Evelyn Roman-Santos is a bilingual Special Education Advocate with 30 years of experience as a School Social Worker.
Based in Hialeah, FL
Advocate
I look forward to helping families and their students get the crucial support they need. I have varied experience working with families and educators at the state and local levels.
These advocates are not based in Florida. They join IEP meetings by video or phone, which IDEA allows when you and the school agree.
Virtual · based in Leonardtown, MD · works with Florida schools
Special Education Advocate
Douglas Hubscher is the Founder and President of Kids Are First, LLC, a special education advocacy firm dedicated to helping families navigate the IEP and 504 process with confidence, clarity, and…
Virtual · based in Harrisburg, PA · works with Florida schools
Special Education Advocate
I’m a special education teacher with experience supporting students with behavioral, intellectual, and learning needs.
Virtual · based in New York, NY · works with Florida schools
Special Education Advocate
Clara Liriano, M.S., is a Special Education Advocate and New York State Certified Special Education Teacher with more than 20 years of experience supporting children and individuals with…
187 public schools inside Miami belong to Miami-Dade County Public Schools. Each one has its own case manager and its own backlog, and the answer you get about scheduling depends on which building your child attends.
Buildings do not fund services and districts do. Ask which office is deciding before you spend a meeting arguing with the wrong one.
Confirm your child's district by address before you send a letter or name a district-specific process.
Federal law lets a state write its own evaluation deadline instead of using the national one. What Florida actually requires is 60 calendar days.
Ask the Miami team for the evaluation report before the meeting, not at it, because nobody reads a long report accurately while the rest of the team waits.
Florida gives a school district 60 calendar days to finish an initial special education evaluation. A written request for an evaluation has to be answered inside 30 days. Missed deadlines are handled by the Florida Department of Education, Bureau of Exceptional Education and Student Services, which takes written state complaints from parents.
Certification programs exist and some advocates hold them. None of them is issued by the Florida Department of Education, Bureau of Exceptional Education and Student Services, and none of them is required to sit in a Florida IEP meeting.
A certificate says nothing about Miami-Dade County Public Schools. Ask instead what the advocate has filed there and what came back.
Hiring an advocate does not pause a deadline or undo a meeting that already happened. The work starts from wherever the Miami file sits today.
What worked for a family in Jacksonville may not fit yours. Ask the advocate what is different about your file before you copy anyone.
Rates and openings decide most of this. An advocate who cannot meet before your Miami meeting date is the wrong hire, and the second-best advocate who is free this month usually beats the best one who is not.
Read a profile for what the advocate actually did, not for what the profile claims. Case detail is the tell.
Answers about hiring a special education advocate in Miami, Florida, including cost, timing, virtual support, and Section 504 help.
What is the hourly rate for a parent advocate?
Rates run $75 to $250 per hour. What moves the number is experience, the type of case, and whether anyone has to drive to the meeting. Profiles here show the rate when the advocate publishes one.
Does Miami-Dade County Public Schools cover every Miami address?
Miami-Dade County Public Schools runs the IEP meetings for most Miami students. District lines and city lines are not the same, so confirm yours by address before you send a letter.
How long can a school take to test my child?
The deadline in Florida for finishing an initial evaluation is 60 calendar days. Put that date on your calendar the day you sign consent, because the district counts from the paperwork and not from the conversation.
Who investigates a school for missing an IEP deadline?
The Florida Department of Education takes written complaints from parents about missed deadlines and services never delivered. An advocate can prepare one. The advocate does not decide it and cannot make the district settle.
What should I have ready before the first call with an advocate?
Start with a one-page timeline of what happened and when. Every advocate you talk to will build the same thing, so writing it yourself saves an hour of billed time.
Official Florida links for parents in Miami.
Last reviewed 2026-08-11.
The same Florida rules apply in Jacksonville, Tampa, Orlando, St. Petersburg and the other cities listed here, or see every Florida advocate.
Search is free. You contact advocates directly.
Do not sign anything at the first meeting if you are unsure. Consent can wait a day.
