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TA Customizer Project—TAC

TA Customizer Project—TAC. Cheryl M. Lange lange003@umn.edu. Outline . What is the Technical Assistance Customizer Project? Why should states consider the TAC approach? Why state-specific TA? How can state’s develop their own primer? What resources can assist you?.

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TA Customizer Project—TAC

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  1. TA Customizer Project—TAC Cheryl M. Lange lange003@umn.edu

  2. Outline • What is the Technical Assistance Customizer Project? • Why should states consider the TAC approach? • Why state-specific TA? • How can state’s develop their own primer? • What resources can assist you?

  3. What is the TAC Project? • A TA project funded by the Charter Schools Program Office of the US Department of Education • The outcome of several years of research documenting the need for special education TA in states with charter school laws • A national primer for operators, state officials, and authorizers • Assistance to ten states for writing state-specific primers

  4. Why should states consider the TAC approach? • Research has documented that charter schools struggle to provide special education and related services • Stakeholders from various arenas play a critical role in developing and/or implementing charter school policies and practices and should be involved in TA within their state

  5. Why should states consider the TAC approach? • States need customized technical assistance materials or training documents that can be used to build charter schools’ capacity to provide special education and related services • TA is necessary to improve the services available for students attending charter schools

  6. Why state-specific TA? • Nearly a decade of research has confirmed significant challenges associated with providing special education and related services in charter schools • Challenges occur at both the policy level and at the implementation level - charter operators, authorizers, and SEA staff struggle to navigate policy issues while negotiating day to day implementation issues.

  7. Why state-specific TA?Policy Issues to Address Research has documented fundamental policy issues associated with implementing special education in the charter school sector: • Legal Identity and Linkage • Autonomy and Regulation – illustrated in the tension between parental choice and team decision-making

  8. Why state-specific TA?Legal Status and Linkage Issues to Address • A charter school is either its own LEA or part of another LEA for special education purposes. • LEA definition and status shape the design and implementation of special education. • Linkage between a charter school and a traditional LEA (the implementation of legal status) is a critical issue.

  9. Why state-specific TA?Policy Tensions to Address A basic policy tension exists between the charter schools’ core principle of autonomy and the compliance and procedural regulation central to special education. One example: the tension between team decision-making the primacy of parental choice.

  10. Why state-specific TA?Implementation Issues to Address • Knowledge gap • Navigating Linkage • Charter school characteristics • Authorizer characteristics • State Education Agency role • Access to special education infrastructure

  11. Implementation Issues: Knowledge Gap Substantive gap between what charter school personnel know about special education and what they need to know • IDEA requires depth of knowledge • Lack of knowledge interferes with successful implementation • Impact of knowledge gap apparent at all levels

  12. Implementation Issues: Linkage Linkage reflects the degree to which a charter school can operate autonomously or conversely, the degree to which it relies upon an LEA for a multiple of issues related to special education: continuum from total- to no-link • Autonomy triggers responsibility which can be overwhelming for a charter school • Linkage to an LEA requires bargaining and brokering between the LEA and the charter school which also has its challenges

  13. Implementation Issues: Charter School Characteristics • Most charter schools are relatively small and cannot take advantage of economies of scale • Charter schools granted to provide unique or “innovative” programs yet required to offer open enrollment • Majority of charter schools are new start-ups with limited experience and knowledge

  14. Implementation Issues: Authorizers • Charter authorizers may only ask charter applicants for little more than general assurances not to discriminate • While some states require training prior to charter schools opening, the vast majority of states do not require any special education related training

  15. Implementation Issues: Authorizers • Authorizers and state education agencies are the primary providers of technical assistance and training to charter schools • Authorizers and individual consultants are the primary providers of ongoing assistance with the provision of special education services in charter schools

  16. Implementation Issues: State Role State provided TA needs to consist of: • Special education technical assistance to individual charter schools • Written documents (e.g., manuals, FAQ documents) specific to special education and charter schools • Training offered specifically for charter schools

  17. Implementation Issues: Infrastructure • A special education infrastructure is a local education agency, an intermediate administrative unit, a cooperative, a community based non-profit, a comprehensive education service provider, or other external entity that provides a charter school with fiscal, human, legal, and organizational capacity that is otherwise virtually impossible to amass in a single school • Project SEARCH identified the importance of infrastructures and Project Intersect examined the role and identity of these infrastructures

  18. Consequences of Implementation Issues • 2/3 of the state charter school officials reported that they have received formal complaints related to special education in charter schools • Majority of the complaints pertained to provision of special education services • Nearly 70% of state charter school officials reported that “counseling-out” is an issue • 33% “small issue;” • 24% “somewhat of an issue;” • 12% “a big issue”

  19. How can states develop their own primer? • Review the primer developed by the TAC Project and use it as a guide. • Convene the major stakeholders including influential charter school operators, the state director of special education, the charter association administrator, a representative from the state’s authorizers. • Facilitate small groups working on an operator and an authorizer primer by going through each page of the template adding and deleting as needed. • Assign roles to each major group to ensure completion of the primer. • Determine who will be responsible for the primer’s printing and/or web distribution.

  20. Developing a State-Specific Primer—A State’s Perspective • The opportunity • The challenges • The outcomes

  21. Resources ► Project SEARCH Final Report: www.nasdse.org/project_search_doc2.pdf ►Completed State Primers: HI: http://doe.k12.hi.us/specialeducation/index_topics.htm ID: http://www.sde.state.id.us/SPECIALED MD: http://marylandpublicschools.org/MSDE/programs/charter_schools ► Project Intersect: www.education.umd.edu/Depts/EDSP/ProjectIntersect

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