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Sequestration and ESEA

May 31, 2013 By

Directors:  At this point in time you may not have felt the full impact of the sequestration cuts. However, the coalition that National Association of State Directors of Special Education (NASDSE) has joined to fight the budget cuts and is desperately seeking stories about the impact of sequestration. Here is a website that you can go to to share your stories:  http://www.nddunited.org/#!contact/ch8q

The Coalition, is a national coalition of 3,200 organizations working to stop budget cuts to core government functions, has just released a video that you can use to educate policymakers, the press, and the public about the disproportionate cuts non-defense discretionary programs –  including employment and training, research, public health, education, public safety, housing, social services, infrastructure, and environmental protection – have taken as a result of deficit reduction efforts and how these cuts will impact our daily lives.

CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE 3-MINUTE, NDD UNITED “NO MORE CUTS” VIDEO http://www.nddunited.org

Acting Assistant Secretary Michael Yudin has also asked NASDSE for stories about the impact of sequestration. So it would be helpful if you are posting a story to share it with me as well and I will share with them with Michael.The news on the budget/sequestration is not good – in fact it is downright depressing. We need to fight as hard as the airlines did to stop sequestration and further budget cuts. We are looking at a budget impasse for FY 2014 as we do not anticipate any agreement between the House and Senate appropriations. Wish I had better news to share.

News on the ESEA bill: Senator Harkin plans to mark up an ESEA bill (Democratic bill only as Senator Alexander and Harkin could not agree on a bill) in the first two weeks of June. This bill might make it to the Senate floor, but no sign yet of a markup in the House. (This is the closest to good news that I can get.)

Filed Under: Directors-Corner

5/30/2013 – UPDATE: Rosa’s Law: Intellectual Disability Terminology Changes

May 30, 2013 By

On October 5, 2010, President Obama signed legislation requiring the federal government to replace the term “mental retardation” with “intellectual disability” in many areas of government. This measure, known as Rosa’s Law, strips the terms “mental retardation” and “mentally retarded” from federal health, education, and labor policy. “Intellectual disability” or “individual with an intellectual disability” are being inserted in place of these outdated terms. The rights of individuals with disabilities remain the same.

ADE is in the conversion process required by this legislation. References to “mental retardation” are being changed to “intellectual disability” and the acronym “MR” is being replaced with the acronym “ID.” The current acronyms for the disability categories of MIMR, MOMR, and SMR are being changed to MIID, MOID, and SID within SAIS. Additionally, references to a “mentally retarded individual” are being changed to an “individual with an intellectual disability” in resource documents, memos, and other supporting documentation throughout ADE.

ADE’s conversion from “MR” to “ID” in SAIS will be introduced following the FY 2013 rollover. However, not all ADE data collection application and resource material conversions will occur immediately after June 30, 2013. The conversion process for other online applications and resource materials is expected to be finalized no later than December 2013.

SAIS business rules were created identifying the areas within SAIS to be modified to accommodate this change. The rules can be found here within the “Business Rules” section of the webpage under fiscal year “2014.”

10/03/2012 – UPDATE: Replacing “Mental Retardation” with “Intellectual Disability”

Please be aware of the changes in red to the verbiage in the original email below regarding the replacement of “mental retardation” (MR) with “intellectual disability” (ID).

For FY 2013 SAIS reporting purposes, student management systems (SMS) should not replace MR codes with ID codes as the SAIS SPED reporting specifications have not changed. It is allowable for SMS vendors to change their system display to show ID as a valid need category, as long as the transaction code values uploaded to SAIS includes the MR codes instead of the ID codes. If a code of ID is submitted to SAIS for FY 2013 reporting, it will be rejected as ID codes are not valid for the current reporting year.

It has come to our attention that some IEP program vendors have modified their software to remove references to MR and have replaced with ID to comply with Rosa’s Law. This can be problematic if the data from the IEP software containing the modified ID codes are rolled up into your SMS. If this is the case for your district, the ID codes will need to be manually changed to MR before creating an upload file and submitting to SAIS.

If you are unsure if your IEP program or SMS vendor has made changes that replace MR codes with ID codes, please take the time to check and confirm as soon as possible. Vender development time may be required to address problems and/or manual changes may need to be made by your data entry personnel and with the October 1 special education child count approaching, we want you to have enough time to submit correct data to SAIS.

Feel free to contact us if you have any questions.  ESSDataMmgt@azed.gov.

Thank you for your continued patience during this transition.

Filed Under: Data Management 13

Public Comments Period for PARCC Accommodations Manual – April 18 through May 13

April 19, 2013 By

Please review and provide feedback on the attached PARCC Accommodations Manual addressing accommodations for students with disabilities and English Learners. Your feedback is critical and the careful consideration of allowable accommodations will greatly impact our students. PARCC will be accepting public comments from April 18 through May 13, 2013.

The draft PARCC Accommodations Manual is a comprehensive policy document that will support local educators in the selection, administration, and evaluation of accommodations for the assessment of SWD and ELs on the PARCC End-of-Year, Performance-Based, and Mid-Year assessment components.

The majority of the proposed accommodations policies in the Manual are currently in use across PARCC states. What is different from many current state accommodations manuals, however, is that the draft PARCC Manual includes not only proposed participation and accommodations policies for SWD and ELs, but also information about tools that will be provided through PARCC’s computer-based assessment delivery system for all students to optimize their performance on the assessments.

The purpose of the stakeholder input process is to engage and encourage feedback from critical stakeholders to meet four specific objectives:

  • Strengthen the draft PARCC Accommodations Manual through strong and targeted feedback from multiple perspectives.
  • Build awareness and understanding of the draft Manual among critical stakeholders in states.
  • Encourage support and buy-in of the draft Manual by giving critical players and the public the opportunity to engage in the development process.
  • Inform the decisions of Governing Board when they vote to adopt the PARCC Accommodations Manual on June 26, 2013.

After the public comment period, PARCC will review and analyze stakeholder feedback in order to make necessary changes to finalize the Manual. The full PARCC Governing Board will be asked to vote on the adoption of the final first edition of the Manual on June 26, 2013.

Draft – PARCC Accommodations Manual

Draft – PARCC Accommodations Manual – Frequently Asked Questions

 

There are separate surveys for EL and SWD accommodations to be completed following your review at this link to the PARCC website:

http://parcconline.org/parcc-draft-accommodations-manual

Remember: Share this web post with all general education and special education teachers as well as other stakeholders! If you have any questions please call the Assessment Section at 602.542.5031. Thank you for taking the time to review this important document.

Filed Under: Archived Posts

Common Core State Standards Webinar May 3, 2013

April 12, 2013 By

ADE/ESS is pleased to announce an upcoming webinar related to Common Core State Standards. In this webinar, Common Core Differences, Sandra Albertie from achievethecore.org will discuss what makes the Common Core State Standards different than the typical state standards that preceeded them. These differences have significant implications on both what and how we teach. She will discuss the major shifts called for by the Standards and explain the rational behind these changes in the classroom. She will also discuss how the work of Common Core State Standards implementation integrates into a system of improving education. Finally, Sandra will share tools and resources that are helpful for understanding and implementing the Standards.

Please send this invitation to all educators who will benefit from learning more about Common Core. The webinar is free and has no participation limitation. The presenter does an effective job of showing participants relevant information to better understand Common Core Standards. Additionally, participants will see how these standards are effectively implemented.

Join us for a Webinar on May 3 from 3:30 – 5:00 PM MST.

Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/159631654

If you have any questions, please email Lisa Aaroe at lisa.aaroe@azed.gov.

To be added to a list of interested participants for our next round of training, please provide your contact information here.

Filed Under: Archived Posts

Guidance from Office of Civil Rights

May 3, 2013 By

Office for Civil Rights

Today, the Office for Civil Rights has released guidance to remind school districts, postsecondary institutions, and other Federal funding recipients of the legal prohibition against retaliation with regard to civil rights complaints and to describe OCR’s methods of enforcement. The DCL does not contain any new policy or new interpretations of law and is supported by well-established caselaw. However, OCR has never before issued any public guidance describing its enforcement of recipients’ non-retaliation obligations.
Please take a moment to read this important guidance at:

If you have any questions, requests for technical assistance, or outreach opportunities where OCR can play a role please contact one of our regional offices. You can always find our list of offices and the regions they support at https://wdcrobcolp01.ed.gov/CFAPPS/OCR/contactus.cfm.

Filed Under: Directors-Corner

U.S. Department of Education Allocation of IDEA Part B Funds

May 3, 2013 By

Arizona’s Grant for IDEA Part B (611)

Arizona received the state allocation tables for IDEA Part B this past week. The short and sweet of it is that our allocation was reduced by 5.6% due to sequestration. Which is about what we thought the reduction would be based on earlier communication from USDoE. However, what was a surprise was that the LEA allocations were reduced by 6.6% or about $11 million dollars. The reduction was taken in the “population and poverty” portion of the allocation formula. Individual LEA allocation reduction may vary due to increases and decreases to the overall student enrollment and number of students living in poverty as reported to the ADE through October enrollment and SAIS during the current fiscal year.

State Administration and State Set-Aside funding had a very slight increase of 2.2%. These set-aside funds cover grants to LEAs for Capacity Building, IDEA and Preschool Emergency, High Cost Child, Secure Care, ESS sponsored professional development activities, program and fiscal monitoring activities overseen by the ESS section.
Arizona’s grant for IDEA Preschool (619) was reduced by 6.6% due to sequestration. In the case of 619 funds, the poverty and population portion of the formula was not funded at all. LEA allocations will be reduced by just less than 3% or $115,568.
Below are links to the Fiscal Year Allocation for Grants to States IDEA Part B Sections 611 and 619.

Filed Under: Directors-Corner

WEBINAR: PARCC Accommodations Manual

May 1, 2013 By

Arizona Education Leaders and Teachers,

PARCC has released the Accommodations Manual for public comment through May 13, 2013. Representatives from Arizona’s Department of Education have been intimately involved and influential in the development of this document and would like to invite questions and feedback from the field.

In order to facilitate this, a webinar has been scheduled for Thursday, May 2, 2013, from 3:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. It is critical that district leadership and EL specialists, as well as general education and special education teachers understand the accommodation proposals contained in the manual. Many of the accessibility features of the new PARCC assessment will impact general education students as well as those with special needs. The PowerPoint presentation will highlight features of the document as well as provide opportunities for questions and feedback.

Please plan to join us for this informative presentation.  Registration is available through the following link: https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/449310806.

Please direct questions to Pat Reynolds at Patricia.Reynolds@azed.gov or via phone, 602-364-1296.

Reminder, the period for public comments on the PARCC Accommodations Manual ends on May 13, 2013.  Please visit the announcement from ADE Assessment here.

 

Filed Under: Archived Posts

Writing a Secondary IEP for Transition Using Best Practice Workshop

April 18, 2013 By

This training applies information from previous Secondary Transition training (s) conducted by our ADE/ESS transition specialists. The expectation is that participants attending this training come with a foundation of Indicator 13 knowledge. It is geared for those that are looking to evaluate their IEPs and increase the potential success of the transition plan, for individuals with disabilities, by answering four essential evaluative questions. You will receive clarification on the differences between interest, preferences, and strengths assessment information, how to approach the development of activities, as well as course work documentation related to the measurable postsecondary goals. After a quick review of Indicator 13 information, each IEP will be reviewed to answer the four essential evaluative questions that are designed to write better ‘transition plans’.

May 1, 2013
2:00 PM – 4:00 PM

Pueblo Magnet High School
3500 S. 12th Ave.
Tucson, AZ

Register for this event here.

Visit the Secondary Transition page.

Please contact Jeannette Zemeida if you have any questions about this program.

Back to Secondary Transition.
Back to ESS Calendar.

Filed Under: Calendar

Significant Intellectual Disabilites/Meeting Secondary Transition IEP Requirements Workshop

April 18, 2013 By

This interactive workshop is especially designed for special educators responsible for developing and implementing IEPs that include transition planning for students with significant intellectual disabilities. Examples of age-appropriate transition assessments and interagency collaboration will be provided.

May 1, 2013
2:00 PM – 4:00 PM

Pueblo Magnet High School
3500 S. 12th Ave.
Tucson, AZ

Register for this event here.

Visit the Secondary Transition page.

Please contact Jeannette Zemeida if you have questions about this program.

Back to Secondary Transition.

Back to ESS Calendar.

Filed Under: Calendar

Great Arizona Teach-In

November 27, 2012 By

SAVE THE DATE

Great Arizona Teach-In

Renaissance Phoenix Glendale Conference Center

April 27, 2013

9:00 a.m. – 3:00 p.m.

The Great Arizona Teach-In is an annual recruitment event that is held exclusively for Arizona schools. This job fair is designed to bring candidates and recruiters together in one central location and typically attracts over 90 recruiters and 800 candidates each year. The Great Arizona Teach-In is a one-stop career fair where education professional can take care of fingerprint requirements, ask questions of university representatives, have résumés reviewed by administrators and finalize certification and highly-qualified requirements by ADE specialists.

Please visit www.teachinaz.com for more information about education employment opportunities in Arizona!  Updates about the Teach-In will be posted in January 2013.

For more information, please contact Tracy Faulkner by email tracy.faulkner@azed.gov or telephone 602-364-2195.

Filed Under: Archived Posts
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