SAI takes a look
down the road
by Dr. Gaylord Tryon, SAI Executive Director
During the past few months we have been extensively involved in a long-range planning effort to help position SAI for the next millennium. Our goal is to develop a 3-5 year plan that will impact programs, services, staffing, budget, and facilities.
On January 14, Tom Slater and Arlinda McKeen from the State Public Policy Group facilitated a very active discussion involving several members of SAI-including our four state officers. We are grateful to the following people for the excellent discussion and meaningful feedback that occurred on January 14:
Steve Fuglsang, elementary principal, Camanche Community School; Gerald Waugh, superintendent, Grundy Center Community School; Phil Hintz, superintendent, Newton Community School; Tom Williams, superintendent, Muscatine Community School; Roxanne Cumings, elementary principal, Waukee Community School; Dave Kwikkel, middle school principal, Schaller-Crestland Comm. Schools; Jan Johnson, middle school principal, Des Moines Independent School; Len Hansen, elementary principal, Sioux City Community School; Ron Reusche, elem.-mid. principal, Nashua-Plainfield Comm. Schools; Linda Devitt, elementary principal, Spencer Community School; Peggy Fillio, middle school principal, Indianola Community School; Jeff Hendred, elementary principal, Ottumwa Community School; Bryan Stearns, secondary principal, Fort Madison Community School; Elaine Smith, asst. supt., human resources, West Des Moines Community School; Cynthia Monroe, elementary principal, Cedar Rapids Community School; Cynthia Morgan, elementary principal, New London Community School; Trudy Day, secondary principal, Iowa City Community School; and Mike Dick, secondary principal, Prairie Valley Comm. School, Gowrie. (The January 14 session was the second step in a four-step planning process. The initial discussion, facilitated by Dr. Jamie Ferrare, Drake University, took place last year.)
Our discussion on January 14 focused on several areas:
To summarize the discussion, the task force concurred that the most important priorities (by general categories) are as follows:
On January 28, the SAI Executive Committee and staff will meet to discuss these issues and develop specific action plans/recommendations that will be presented to the Representative Council later this spring. These action plans will include specific goals, timelines, and budgetary implications. Depending on which recommendations are adopted, the final areas discussed will be how all of this impacts our staffing and facility needs.
SAI officially came into existence on September 1, 1987, with the successful merger of the Educational Administrators of Iowa (building principals) and the Iowa Association of School Administrators (superintendents and central office administrators). While we are still a relatively young organization, we need to take a critical look at where we have been and what might/ should lie ahead if we are going to continue serving our members and working on behalf of K-12 education in Iowa.
This is our third major effort since 1987 to reflect on where we have been and where we might be going. SAI has become stronger as a result of each planning process.
The planning effort with which we are currently involved will help us determine our own destiny and better serve the needs and interests of our members. That's what SAI is all about-enhancing the professional lives of our members to better meet the needs of our K-12 students.
Behavior issues under
the reauthorized IDEA: ARE YOU UP TO SPEED?
by Kathy Lee Collins, J.D., SAI Director of Legal Services
It's always a little tricky when a new law goes into effect. On Tuesday,
you can do "X" and you can't do "Y," and the next day,
the effective date of a new or amended statute, you're prohibited by law
from doing "X" or "Y" and mandated to do "Z."
It's incumbent upon your professional organization to keep you apprised
of changes in the law, but in my experience, it takes about five years (!)
before every single school district in Iowa is aware of a change in the
law or a new law. (Apparently some administrators throw all mail from the
Department of Education in the "round file" immediately and set
the updates from SAI and IASB in the "reading-to-do" pile that
somehow never gets "to-done.")
Dr. Carl Smith, a former colleague of mine from the D.E., is now the Director of the Resource Center for Issues in Special Education at Drake University. He recently shared with me and a few others the results of some case law research he has done in the area of behavior issues (post-reauthorized IDEA). The cases Carl studied covered the period of time immediately after the reauthorized laws went into effect (June 1997) through December 1998 and included state administrative law judge (ALJ) decisions, some court cases, and an occasional OCR (Office for Civil Rights, U.S. Department of Education) decision. I found Carl's research very interesting. At the very least we can all "go to school" on what our colleagues have learned the hard way.
As a refresher for most of you (and perhaps "new news" to some of you), when Congress reenacted the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), they added a few provisions that weren't in the 1975 law. Some of the most significant additions were in the area of discipline of students with behavior problems. For example, the new IDEA requires that before a student can be suspended or "expelled" for more than ten days, the IEP team has to do a "Manifestation Determination" to decide if the misbehavior that was the impetus for removing the student is substantially related to the student's disability. The underlying premise is, of course, that we can't punish students for behavior caused by their disability. At least, we can't kick them out of school for longer than 10 days.
In making this decision of "relatedness," the IEP team is supposed to consider all relevant information including evaluation and diagnostic results; information supplied by the parent; (multiple) observations of the student; and his/her placement and IEP. In looking at all the data, the team is supposed to determine first if the student's IEP and placement were appropriate at the time s/he misbehaved and make sure that the school was providing all of the things required on the IEP. If we make it past those two hurdles, we then get to decide whether or not (1) "the child's disability impaired the ability of the child to understand the impact and consequences of the misbehavior;" and (2) whether the child's disability impaired his/her ability to control the behavior that led to the disciplinary action. This is clearly not the same question as "whether Johnny knows right from wrong" or whether Johanna should be held to comply with the same rules as all the other students in the school.
The other "new" things added in terms of discipline of students identified as receiving special education are the tandem requirements that we conduct a functional behavioral assessment (FBA) and develop a behavior intervention plan ("Holy Acronyms, Batman! It's a BIP!") for any student, regardless of "label," who has a history of misbehaving. The FBA helps us understand what triggers some of the student's reactions and misconduct and allows us to try to minimize or avoid those things. The BIP is supposed to focus on positive interventions (i.e., education!) to change the student's behavior. I realize most of us are more comfortable with the traditional, mostly negative or punitive consequences for misconduct. We need to turn that around, but for all kids, not just special ed. students. In addition, we need to share those findings and plans with all staff who come into contact with these students so everyone is singing off the same page of the hymnal.
When Congress codified these concepts it helped us, in my opinion, by telling us what it is that we are supposed to be evaluating at a staffing and what questions to ask when a special ed kid gets in trouble at school. Of course, the answers to Manifestation Determination questions (1) and (2) are still the really tough part, but remember: many, many judges view the procedural requirements of the IDEA as the only thing they should review. Judges-maybe not all but many-have no desire to assess the wisdom of the educational decisions made by the staffing team, so following procedures is important. If you can show the court (or the ALJ) that you are aware of and respect the requirements of the law, you may have half the battle won.
Carl's research is instructive for us. In some ways, we can write off some of the losses by the school districts as ignorance of the law. It's no legal excuse, but it does explain why school personnel in some of the cases didn't do what's required under the new law. They hadn't heard yet.
Cases involving Functional Behavioral Assessment (FBA) - 10
Cases where school lost because FBA not done - 5
Cases where school lost because FBA not adequate - 4
("Most salient reason for not supporting FBA was limited data [ single
observation, limited review of records")
Learn from this!
Cases involving Behavioral Intervention Plans - 19
Major issue was when to develop plans (parents thought "sooner;"
schools thought "later." "When done, 44% of plans were considered
adequate.")
Staff training can be a major issue.
Court may ask: Can you demonstrate that your program/plan deals with
students' needs rather than fixating on power and control?
Cases involving Manifestation Determinations (MD) - 23
(Major issue is when to do it.)
Cases where parents won when MD should have been done 9/13
Cases where school won when MD was done 9/10
Do you see what you need to do? And the earlier the better!
I have not mentioned the cases involving the up-to-45-day interim alternative placements for students who have "carrie[d] a [dangerous] weapon to school or "knowingly possesse[d] or use[d] illegal drugs or [sold] or solicit[ed] the sale of a controlled substance..." at school. To summarize, of the 12 cases Carl studied, the school won 3. Of the nine lost, 3 were lost because the temporary placement did not address the IEP needs of the student. Another 3 were lost because the interim alternative educational setting plan did not address the behaviors of concern. Finally, the last 3 lost were because of procedural violations, pure and simple. (Probably faulty notice or unilateral decision-making by the administration as to where the alternative placement is to be. Remember, the reauthorized IDEA gives the school the right to impose a unilateral change in placement for up to 45 days, but the staffing team decides where and what.)
With special education cases being the largest category of legal actions against schools, it behooves us to keep abreast of the law and apprised of the way the various levels of judges are deciding these cases. It's not a complete crap-shoot, boys and girls. We can take measures that will reduce the potential of losing a special ed. appeal or lawsuit. Get (and stay) up to speed!
Considerations for behavior issues
Dr. Smith also spotted some trends in these early cases, and he has offered
the following advice for school administrators and teams:
And they're off...
by Dr. Marcus Haack, SAI Associate Executive Director
Whenever I sit down at the computer to write my monthly column, I take a look at what I wrote the previous year. It helps give me a perspective of what things were like 12 months ago. Plus it gives me some ideas about what I should be addressing this year. Here's how I opened my February column one year ago: The Iowa legislature kicked off its 1998 session on January 12 with grand promises that education would take top priority, along with hog lots, the death penalty, tax reductions, etc., etc.! Sound familiar?
Fast forward to February, 1999. Twelve months have passed and the 1999 session of the Iowa General Assembly is back at it, once again promising that education will be a top priority. Along with that promise it appears that education will still be competing with hog lots and tax reductions during legislative debate. I was under the impression that at least this year we wouldn't have to compete with legislation to re-establish the death penalty. But during the first week of the session there it was, yet another attempt to make Iowa one of an ever-growing list of states using lethal injection to execute criminals.
On the positive side, at least during the initial stages of legislative activity, the dynamics have changed. The newly inaugurated Democratic governor and the Republican controlled House and Senate are going the extra mile to pledge cooperation and bipartisanship in their efforts to address the critical needs of Iowa's schools.
As of this writing Governor Vilsack has yet to make his budget presentation to the legislature. However, it's certain to include programs (and funding!) for reading, early childhood education and support, smaller class size at the primary level, assistance to school districts for infrastructure needs and an allowable growth rate in the range of 4.0%. While the governor is undoubtedly going to push for legislation that increases the state's financial support of schools, he's also a realist, stating that all of Iowa's educational needs can't be met in one year. For example, he's made it clear that the joint resolution adopted by SAI, ISEA and IASB calling for an additional $300,000,000 can't be funded.
Where will the Republicans be coming from? A flurry of bills filed by the House Republican caucus gives an indication of their priorities. Here's a sample:
HJR 1: A joint resolution calling for amendments to the Iowa constitution which would limit state general fund expenditures and restrict certain state tax revenue changes (formerly known as the Taxpayer Rights Amendment).
HF 1: An appropriation of $15,000,000 for 1999-2000 to school districts for reducing class size, improving student behavior, classroom management and reading.
HF 2: Establishing English as the common language of Iowa.
HF 4: A $4,000,000 annual appropriation for partial on-time funding for school districts experiencing enrollment increases.
HF 11: A 101% budget guarantee for school districts experiencing enrollment declines.
HF 14: A $9,000,00 annual appropriation for establishing and implementing an early elementary reading grant program for mandated reading assessments, professional development for reading teachers and to assist students in beginning reading.
HF 16: An appropriation of $22,000,000 to eliminate or reduce the special education deficit.
HF 17: A comprehensive bill which addresses a number of practitioner preparation and professional development issues for beginning, as well as experienced educators.
HF 22: An increase in the regular program foundation base per pupil and weighted special education base to 89.3%
HF 24: A requirement that a systematic, phonics-based approach to teaching language arts and communication skills in kindergarten, as well as English-language arts in grades one through three.
HF 60: Increasing weighted enrollment for dual enrollment students.
Oh yes, I almost forgot to mention HF 26. It would re-establish the death penalty.
As I write this column there appears to be a lot in common between most (but certainly not all) Republican proposals and those expected to be included in Governor Vilsack's budget proposals. Bipartisanship should last somewhat longer than normal during this legislative session. After all, no one wants to relive the 1998 "Year of Education" fiasco.
Thanks in advance for your help in making sure this year's legislative
session provides positive support for Iowa's schools and communities, and
especially for Iowa's children. Be sure to contact me with any information
you have that could help SAI advocate for you as school administrators and
for the children you serve.
Take an active interest and role in this year's legislative session
Here are some suggestions:
Building staff morale
by Lisa Bartusek, communications director, Iowa Association of School Boards
As a school administrator, you know the value of high staff morale.
When school employees are enthusiastic, loyal, committed to their jobs and
the school district's mission, they will work together to see that students
are provided with the best education possible.
Many factors affect morale, including district reputation, management
attitude and communication. What can you do to build high staff morale in
your building or district? Consider these tips.
Lead with credibility
Communicate
Celebrate
Focusing on your commitment to credibility, communication and celebration
throughout the year can help maintain staff morale, even when times are
tough, such as budget cuts or controversies.
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