State alters special-ed monitoring

A state monitoring system for special education is under revision because of a federal shift in what it means for states to satisfy the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

Until this year, the federal Office of Special Education Programs evaluated states on their compliance with the law. This year, the office shifted to a new system that evaluated them on compliance and how well special-education children performed on state and national tests.

Balancing compliance and student test results presents a challenge, said Lisa Haley, associate director for special education for the Arkansas Department of Education.

“If we aren’t looking at everything in terms of compliance, there’s a fear we might be missing something affecting students getting services they need,” Haley said. “If we focus only on compliance, we don’t have time to focus on things that lead to better results for kids.”

Special-education supervisors from districts across the state will learn more about the change during an annual meeting set for Monday and Tuesday at the Holiday Inn Little Rock Airport, Haley said.

The U.S. Department of Education in March 2012 announced plans to develop the new review system and put more emphasis on how well states educate students with disabilities. Implementation of the results-driven accountability system began this year.

“The vast majority of children who are in special education don’t have cognitive disabilities,” said Melody Musgrove, director of the Office of Special Education Programs at the U. S. Department of Education. “The majority can and should be able to achieve grade-level standards.”

WHAT THE LAW SAYS

The federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act exists to ensure that all children with disabilities have access to free and appropriate educations, including special education and related services, the law states. Nationwide, the law affects a variety of programs provided to more than 6.5 million infants, toddlers, children and teenagers with disabilities.

Arkansas public schools have about 55,000 children in special-education programs. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act this year provided the state with $110.3 million in federal money for school-age children in special education, Haley said.

The federal Office of Special Education Programs released the first evaluations of states under the new system

this summer. States received one of three designations: “meets requirements,” “needs assistance” or “needs intervention.” Half of the evaluation was based on compliance and half was based on educational results. This year, educational results were measured by performance and participation of special-education children in fourth and eighth grades on state and national exams.

Repeated ratings of “needs assistance” or “needs intervention” can lead to restrictions on the use of federal money for special education or reduction in federal funding, according to the federal regulations.

Arkansas received a “needs assistance” rating, a downgrade from its usual rating of “meets requirements,” with one concern being low performance of students in literacy, Musgrove said.

Haley agrees with giving more attention to the educational results of children with disabilities, but she has concerns about the limited testing data used in the first evaluation. She also thinks educational results should include more than just test scores.

“We think we need to do better for kids with disabilities,” she said. “We think what you focus on gets better.”

Musgrove said the evaluation system will evolve to include more measures of educational results, such as improvement in test scores or higher graduation rates, she said.

Test scores of special-education students have been part of the federal accountability system for states under the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, but that act is tied to federal Title I money that states receive primarily for the education of children in low-income families.

The new evaluation system under Individuals with Disabilities Education Act affects money provided specifically for disabled children.

The next step in implementing results-driven accountability is for states to develop a systemic improvement plan that will be submitted in two phases, with April 15, 2015, being the first deadline, Musgrove said.

The state department is in the initial stages of developing the improvement plan, said Jennifer Gonzales, systemic improvement plan coordinator for Arkansas. The department plans to seek input from administrators, teachers and parents as it evaluates special-education testing data, state policies, communication efforts, training programs and assistance programs for districts, Gonzales said.

“We really want this to be a true statewide plan,” Gonzales said. “It should be integrated and aligned with what we’re doing.”

REVIEW OF POLICIES

The changes at the federal level have prompted a review of state policies and procedures that govern the state monitoring system of school districts under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, Haley said.

Under the current state monitoring system, teams have conducted comprehensive, on-site reviews of school districts on about a four-year cycle, Haley said. Those reviews will continue. The teams review documentation in student folders and district policies. They also observe and interview teachers, who often are asked to show the documentation that they keep on their special-education students.

Districts are written up if they are out of compliance and must make corrections, Haley said.

“Sometimes there is so much due process paperwork, people sometimes get to where they’re just checking boxes,” Haley said.

With the increased emphasis on educational performance, Haley said she hopes the state system will allow monitoring teams to look at compliance differently. The monitoring system could change so that when state officials check that students received accommodations, they take a closer look at whether the accommodations fit what each student needs to achieve, Haley said.

“What do we know that’s making a difference for kids?” she said. “We’re going to focus more closely on those things.”

As the state makes changes, Sherry Stewart, Rogers School District director of special services, hopes monitoring visits continue to involve interviews with teachers. The district this year has 1,602 special-education students.

“I think that validates teachers and also gives them an opportunity to have a voice,” Stewart said.

Monitoring visits require a lot of preparation and are stressful because the paperwork has to be perfect, said Tina Rooks, special-education director for the West Memphis School District, where 645 students receive special-education services.

Still, the need to be in compliance is beneficial in getting support for special-education directors who must persuade administrators to work with them in meeting the needs of disabled students, Rooks said. The space requirements, for example, help ensure that principals provide a place, other than a hallway or the library, for a child to meet with a speech language pathologist or adaptive physical-education coach.

Rooks said districts already are held to a high level of accountability for special-education students, and she disagrees with focusing so much on test results.

“There’s not a principal, there’s not a teacher, anyone in our district that isn’t striving,” Rooks said. “We’re all working toward that accountability of each individual student. We’re all held accountable. … That level of accountability needs to be reasonable.”