U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan confronted difficult questions asked by special educators who are members of the Council for Exceptional Children (CEC), in a document released today.
Ask Arne: A Conversation with CEC Members and the U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan (found here) addresses the inclusion of students with disabilities and the professionals who work on their behalf in controversial education reform initiatives supported by the Obama Administration, including pay-for-performance and measuring student growth over time for accountability purposes.
“Thanks to the Secretary’s willingness to reach out to CEC members, our field has answers to some of its questions about how students with disabilities and special education professionals will fit into the Administration’s education reform agenda,” said CEC President Marilyn Friend.
Special educators have been concerned about how pay-for-performance initiatives can fairly incorporate the performance of students with disabilities, given imperfect assessments and research which shows that isolating a single educator’s impact on a student’s achievement is difficult, particularly when a student is taught by a team of teachers, as is often the case.
Despite these concerns, both the Race to the Top initiative and the Administration’s blueprint for the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) included policies to encourage pay-for-performance initiatives, but -- until now -- failed to provide details on how they would fairly incorporate special educators and all educators of students with disabilities.
Answering a CEC member’s question on this issue, Duncan detailed concepts such as “multiple measures” for evaluation, which he said could include observations by trained evaluators; student and parental feedback; portfolios of student work; yearly academic growth; and district-developed assessments.
“Systems will have to recognize, of course, that a simple 25-1 relationship of students to teachers isn’t the reality for many students and teachers,” Duncan said, adding that this may mean giving multiple teachers recognition for the achievement gains for a student they both taught, or it may mean using group-based measures for a team of teachers who work with overlapping groups of students.
Duncan went on to say that he recognizes the prevalence and effectiveness of team teaching and that teacher evaluations will need to support and reward teachers working in team teaching or other cooperative models.
CEC has long advocated for systems that consider special educators to be integral to the academic, social and emotional development of students with disabilities, as well as the success of the school community. CEC was pleased that many of its recommendations for creating meaningful evaluation systems were reflected in the Secretary’s response.
Assessments and accountability
In response to a CEC member’s question about assessments and accountability systems, Duncan said students won’t meet high standards until they are given access to the regular education curriculum that includes the educational content needed to demonstrate academic competency.
“Students with disabilities should be regarded as regular education students first, and they should receive the special education and related services guaranteed under IDEA,” Duncan said. “In order to help them succeed, all students should have access to high-quality, grade-level instruction aligned to college-and career-ready standards. Students won’t meet high standards until they are given access to the regular education curriculum that includes the educational content needed to demonstrate academic competency.”
Other questions addressed by Duncan focus on early learning initiatives, transition activities, universal design for learning, and technology.
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