Does budget make untrained staff responsible for special ed needs of speech and language kids?

Can anyone explain Discussion Item C-9, which says "Excluding from the cross-categorical special education allocation formula, Students with a Speech and Language Only Disability?" (I attached the district's explanation below.)

It appears that speech and language clinicians will provide "special education services and supports," but speech and language clinicians aren't trained to deliver special education services. Is it a good idea to have untrained staff providing services to kids who need specially trained staff?

Additionally, this change will supposedly eliminate 22.5 FTE educational assistants and 22.5 FTE teachers. Will those positions be special education EAs and teachers?

It appears to me that special education students are going to be badly short-changed and mis-served.

Does anyone have another take on the cuts?

Discussion Item C-9
Department of Educational Services
Division of Special Education

Discussion Item: Excluding from the cross-categorical special education allocation formula, Students with a Speech and Language Only Disability

Background: The formula used for the past 5 years to determine a school’s base crosscategorical
special education teacher and corresponding assistant (SEA) allocation has relied on a number of inputs. These inputs are:
- an unduplicated count of students with disabilities who are currently receiving special education from a cross-categorical teacher,
- transfer students that have enrolled at a MMSD school with an IEP from another district whose transfer Individualized Education Program (IEP) paperwork has not yet been completed and processed,
- a count of students who have been initially referred to special education and are through the eligibility phase of the IEP process with a documented disability and need for special education (their IEP program and placement has not yet been completed),
- a percentage of the students who have been initially referred to special education and are not yet through the eligibility phase of the initial IEP process. The percentage is computed by using the placement rate (i.e., percentage of students initially referred who were placed into special education) for the previous year for elementary, middle and high schools and then applying this percentage rate to the referrals for each school that are “in process” and have not yet resulted in eligibility determination. Consequently,each school was credited for a percentage of their initial referrals that are still in process using the prior year placement rate,
- **a count of students who have a speech and language only disability where the IEP team has determined they would benefit from services by a cross-categorical special education teacher in addition to the services they are receiving from a Speech and Language therapist.

Anticipated Savings: $2,158,285

Impact: ** Eliminating the counting of students who have a Speech and Language only disability as an input to the cross-categorical formula will require that Speech and Language clinicians assume primary responsibility for special education services and supports to address the student’s language needs when educated in a general education setting. Speech and Language clinicians currently have a “Support Services Week” that is used to provide consultation to staff, complete assessments, IEP paperwork, etc.Students generally have not received direct services during this week. This week, therefore, can be used to provide consultative support to staff and students who have language needs in the general education setting.

Posted by Ed Blume at April 13, 2007 8:48 PM
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