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Judy B. Engelhard, CAN Coordinator for the Division for Learning Disabilities, provides brief reports for TeachingLD.org so that visitors can keep informed about important developments in policies affecting students with learning disabilities and their teachers. TeachingLD.org is pleased to offer this page as a place for people concerned with learning disabilities to keep up to date.
15 February 2008
Response to Intervention (RTI) RESOURCES
The U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) awarded a $14.2 million dollar grant to the American Institutes for Research to create the National Center on Response to Intervention. The Center will serve as the primary source of knowledge, expertise, and resources on Response to Intervention (RTI). School administrators, teachers, and parents will have access to the Center's information, and the Center will also work with schools and districts that wish to expand their RTI programs.
For more information on the 5-year grant, click here.
CEC’s Position on RTI
The Council for Exceptional Children recently published a position paper on Response to Intervention that can be found here.
CONGRESS PASSES FY08 BUDGET
In December 2007, Congress finally passed the FY08 budget; the bill that the House and Senate passed lowered spending by 40% for many federal agencies, including the Department of Education. Appropriations for education received a 3.3% increase from FY07, an amount that does not match the inflation rate in certain education programs including IDEA. Therefore, it is expected that education programs across the nation face reduced funding and resources.
The new appropriations for FY08 include the following:
IDEA Part B - $259 million increase
IDEA Section 619 Preschool - reduced by $6.65 million
IDEA Part C Infants and Toddlers - reduced by $746,000
IDEA Part D:
Javits Gifted and Talented Education: reduced by $130,000
Title I of No Child Left Behind - $1.6 billion increase
Head Start - reduced by $10.58 million
Early Reading First - reduced by $5 million
Even Start - reduced by $15.8 million
Reading First - reduced by $636 million
NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND (NCLB) REAUTHORIZATION UPDATE
January 8, 2008 marks the 6th Anniversary of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) which is the current version of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) of 1965. Although reauthorization of ESEA/NCLB has stalled and may not even be taken up in 2008 since it’s an election year, DLD continues to work with other groups (including CEC’s Public Policy Unit) in formulating recommendations for the reauthorization as various bills are introduced in Congress. To keep up with the action on NCLB in the House of Representatives go to http://edlabor.house.gov/micro/nclb.shtml. Chairman Kennedy of the U.S. Senate has not taken up reauthorization of NCLB.
President George Bush Holds Firm on Key Points in NCLB
At the end of 2007, President Bush noted that the upcoming NCLB reauthorization negotiations are an example of how the White House and Congress could work together, although he threatened to veto attempts to weaken the law. The Bush administration strongly opposes the following proposals offered during current debate on NCLB reauthorization:
More information on the Bush administration’s position on NCLB is available at http://www.ed.gov/policy/elsec/leg/nclb/buildingonresults.pdf.
Secretary Spellings Expands Growth Model Pilot for NCLB
On December 7, 2007, Secretary Spellings announced that the growth model pilot will become open for all eligible states. Spellings cited the success of other growth model pilots which have strong bipartisan support for the expansion. "A growth model is a way for states that are raising achievement and following the bright-line principles of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) to strengthen accountability," Secretary Spellings said. "I believe that extending the growth model pilot for the 2007-2008 school year will promote two important goals. It will allow states another effective way of measuring adequate yearly progress (AYP) by measuring individual student growth over time, and it will continue to expand the flexibility available to states under No Child Left Behind." Since the pilot's inception in November 2005, nine states have participated including North Carolina, Tennessee, Delaware, Arkansas, Florida, Iowa, Ohio, Alaska and Arizona.
GET INVOLVED AND SIGN-UP TO RECEIVE POLICY UPDATES
If you have specific recommendations related to policy or legislative issues that you wish DLD to consider, we welcome you to use TeachingLD's contact form and link to “content issues” in the drop down menu; use this same form to receive weekly updates from the CEC Policy & Advocacy Unit; please put "public policy" in the subject line. For specific recommendations, it is helpful if you provide examples that illustrate how students with learning disabilities or their teachers are affected. You are encouraged to get involved by visiting the CEC Legislative Action Center and write your members of Congress on special education issues.
Judy B. Engelhard
DLD/Public Policy Committee Chair & CAN Coordinator
http://www.teachingld.org/can_reports/
