Update: March 19, 2018 from the Texas Tribune.
“The TEA released the 42-page draft strategic plan Monday, a couple of months after a 15-month federal investigation concluded Texas had not been providing kids with disabilities the tools and services they needed to learn, likely failing to educate thousands of students and violating federal law.”
You’ll find the complete article here – In new plan, Texas Education Agency vows special education overhaul with limited dollars
https://www.texastribune.org/2018/03/19/tea-strategic-plan-special-ed/
“Federal officials found the state was effectively incentivizing school districts to keep their special education numbers low and that many teachers fundamentally misunderstood the legal requirements around educating kids with disabilities.”
“After conversations with parents and advocates, the Texas Education Agency on Monday released a second draft of its plan for overhauling the way it educates students with disabilities — while highlighting the agency’s limitations on available funds.”
“Texans can provide commentary on the draft, which will be finalized and submitted to the federal government by April 18.”
Proposed Plan
Read more information about the Corrective Action Response and the proposed draft of the Special Education Improvement Plan on the TEA website.
https://tea.texas.gov/TexasSPED/
Download the Draft Special Education Improvement Plan and Corrective Action Response (March 19, 2018)
https://tea.texas.gov/WorkArea/DownloadAsset.aspx?id=51539620634
Public Comment
The public is invited to provide specific comments on the current proposed draft Special Education Improvement Plan in writing by emailing TexasSPED@tea.texas.gov.
TEA will aggregate the feedback received before sending a final version to OSEP by April 18, 2018.
Read More
TEA Violated Federal Laws – Corrective Action Ordered
https://www.wrightslaw.com/blog/tea-violated-federal-laws-corrective-action-ordered/
INVESTIGATION: How Texas Keeps Tens of Thousands of Kids Out of Special Ed
https://www.wrightslaw.com/blog/investigation-how-texas-keeps-tens-of-thousands-of-kids-out-of-special-ed/
I am interested to see as a military family how TEA tackles this federal mandate. We have students in a large district and there has been zero mention of USDoE, Gov Abbott’s directive and TEA’s attempts to fix a very broken system. I think TEA could do a better job of communicating this and definitely districts have to communicate this to parents. But given that our district still follows antiquated “ideology” regarding Special Education, I’m not surprised that districts aren’t advertising or even trying to identify students who need support and services. In our particular district, and we’ve been a part of 7 in our military careers, this is the least Special Ed friendly we’ve encountered. They work with general ed or the most disabled, there is no middle ground.
TEA is now calling this an “improvement” plan. “The broader steps of this strategic plan are meant to help more fully support students with disabilities in Texas in every aspect of their education, focused not just on access to supports but also on improved outcomes from those supports.” Comments can be made on this plan until noon on April 13, 2018. Partners Resource Network, the TX parent training and information center will be holding a webinar on the plan April, 2, at 12:15 CDT. See our FB page for more information.
Thanks, Chuck. For those interested, here’s the FB link. https://www.facebook.com/PRNTexas/