April 6, 2014

1. Improving Efficiencies and Effectiveness in Special Education: A Process Approach April 6, 2014

2. Your Presenter Michael Neiman, Ph.D. CCC/S-LP Executive Vice President Futures Education

3. Presentation Overview The Discussion: • Special Education program delivery/fiscal challenges • District budget reductions • Maximization of district budget allocations without reduction in services • Potential strategies to improve efficiencies and effectiveness

4. The Reality

5. The Reality (cont.)The Changing Face of Special Education

6. Reflection-Group Discussion 1 Have you ever had to cut a program or service as a result of unexpected expenditures in special education?

7. Principals Underlying Themes ISSUES OF EFFICIENCY AND EFFECTIVENESS ARE ALMOST ALWAYS RELATED. Examples:

8. The Fallacy “There isn’t anything you can do about Special Education costs – it is all required and mandated…”

9. A Discussion of Efficiencies and Effectiveness

10. Reflection-Group Discussion 2 Have you ever been told that special education services and programs were “untouchable” and/or felt pressure not to question expenditures in this area?

11. The Conversation Today • Special Education is not a place, it is a service • Special Education is a complex support system • Systemic short and long term approaches can be identified and developed for significant savings in Special Education without negatively affecting students • Nine driving forces coming out of research from over 180 school districts identifies major areas of cost with significant opportunity for redesign and cost savings • The closer a district can achieve success in managing the nine identified driving forces, district costs will remain level or decrease while student outcomes will improve

12. The Nine Driving Forces • Culture • Clinical Related Service Providers • Professional Development • Pre-Referral Considerations • Utilization of Paraprofessionals • Team Leaders and Case Managers • Out of District Placements • Unions and Work Laws • Resource Allocation and Span of Control

13. Culture • Building the silo: districts with distinct separation between regular and special education had higher costs and less satisfactory performance • Districts with increased focus on inclusion and transparency had lower costs and more satisfactory outcomes • The more remote the commitment of all principals and teachers to work with all students, the higher the cost and more pronounced dissatisfaction with performance outcomes • The further removed district leadership was from complete and routine appreciation of the data, the higher the costs and the less satisfaction with performance

14. Reflection-Group Discussion 3 What’s your sense of the culture of student ownership in your District?

15. Clinical Related Service Providers • Districts without consistently strong and tight oversight had a higher incidence rate of self-referral, overt or tacit parental collusion, and less frequent alignment with the curriculum with associated higher costs • Universal practice pattern issues: (1) self-scheduling; (2) uniformity (e.g., entrance and exit criteria); (3) IEP “strong arming”; (4) promotion of the culture of discharge • Universal Management Issues: An absence of an electronic data collection system that captures : (1) utilization of time; (2) admissions; (3) discharges; (4) practices that support LRE; and (5) equity of workloads

16. Professional Development • Districts have not uniformly invested in professional development • Districts routinely spent more than 84% of the school budget on salaries; but less than 1/2% on training • Professional development often addresses compliance and test scores • District-wide, routine and broadly inclusive, training/mentoring result in lower costs and greater satisfaction with outcomes • Broader view of professional development than just contract compliance mentoring/coaching; blogs; conference calls; study groups; peer reviews

17. Early Intervening-RtI Processes • Districts that assigned this as a Special Education responsibility had a higher cost and identification rate than districts assigning this leadership to regular education (RtI and IDEA) • Leadership less conversant with the data had higher costs and less satisfactory performance • Districts with an effective co-teaching model have become less reliant on pre-referral processes • Some districts have been very creative, using the pre-referral process as a “step down” as well as a “step up” • Districts that have invested in Tier 1 interventions appear to have had better success in curbing referrals to the pre-referral process

18. Utilization of Paraprofessionals • Districts tended to focus on numbers/costs rather than utility/success • Management issues: (1) absence of entrance and exit criteria; (2) parental-teacher reliance; (3) student-centric vs. program-centric assignment; and (4) community entrenchment • Districts without tight management had higher costs and less satisfactory performance • Limited professional development reducing personnel and programmatic capacity

19. Team Leaders and Case Managers • These are the key members to ensure programmatic fidelity, state compliance, and fiscal integrity, and serve as the right arm of the special education director in the schools • The greater the focus on case management skills, the lower the cost and the more satisfactory the performance: That is both compliance and programmatic vision are of equal importance • The reduction in professional development increases cost and supports negative outcomes • The importance of articulating a unified District vision with the accompanying “ammunition” of air-tight District documents (e.g., exit and entry criteria)

20. Out of District Placements • The training and programmatic capacities have not kept pace with the student needs and complexities • Student with emotional and behavioral health challenges constitute the population with the highest resource demands and are typically the least accepted in their schools • The less the district invested in core capacities of addressing mental health and behavioral issues, the higher the cost and more exclusive the service, including the need for outplacements

21. Reflection-Group Discussion 4 How has your district addressed the issue of out of district placements?

22. Union and Work LawsReflection-Group Discussion 5 What constraints exist in your board policies and/or contract language that limit or hinder the ability to provide supports to students?

23. Resource Allocation: Span of Control • Our experience indicates many districts struggle in the effectiveness and efficiency in their expenditures of their finite special education resources • Districts attending to rethinking and reorganizing the delivery system had more stable costs

24. Strategy 1: An Analysis of Special Education

25. Strategy 2: Professional Development and Implementation

26. Strategy 2: Professional Development and Implementation (cont.)

27. Strategy 3: Management of District Staff

28. Strategy 4: Privatization of Staffing

29. Reflection-Group Discussion 6 What obstacles would you see to considering any of these 4 models in your district?

30. Discussion and Q & A