Last week, Representative Duncan Hunter (R-CA), chairman of the Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education, introduced the second -- in what House leaders say will be a series of bills reauthorizing the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) -- this one focused entirely on increasing access to charter schools. The “Empowering Parents Through Quality Charter Schools Act” (H.R. 2218) would expand the current federal Charter School Program and provide grants to states to help facilitate development and expansion of charter schools. As introduced, it includes some minimal protections to encourage charter schools to address the needs of students with disabilities.
Based on reports from around the nation that charter schools often either (1) “counsel out” students with disabilities, advising them the charter school doesn’t have the ability to serve them or (2) enroll them at much lower rates than the surrounding traditional public schools, CEC has recommended that Congress add protections to the law to ensure that students with disabilities are appropriately included and served.
H.R. 2218 would expand the current Charter School Program by providing states more incentives to support the development and expansion of charter schools. The bill, as introduced, would add some protections to ensure charter schools address the needs of students with disabilities, including requiring charter authorizers to ensure charters they govern can meet the needs of students with disabilities, allowing states to use some of the funding to provide technical assistance to charter school operators in serving students with disabilities and requiring that charters enroll students with disabilities at a “rate similar to traditional public schools in the area.”
CEC remains vigilant in working with Congress and the Administration to ensure that all education initiatives, including charter schools, appropriately include students with disabilities and reinforce the existing requirement to comply with IDEA.
You can read more of CEC’s coverage of charters and a recent hearing held by the Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education examining the role of charter schools in the nation’s education system in the Policy Insider here.
An archived webcast of the hearing, as well as related documents, can be found here.
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