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TA Customizer Project—TAC

Cheryl M. Langelange003@umn.edu

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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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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

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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

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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

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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.

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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

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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.

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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.

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

Implementation Issues: Authorizers

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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

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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

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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”

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How can states develop their own primer?

1. Review the primer developed by the TAC Project and use it as a guide.

2. 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.

3. Facilitate small groups working on an operator and an authorizer primer by going through each page of the template adding and deleting as needed.

4. Assign roles to each major group to ensure completion of the primer.

5. Determine who will be responsible for the primer’s printing and/or web distribution.

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Developing a State-Specific Primer—A State’s Perspective

The opportunity

The challenges

The outcomes

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Resources

► Project SEARCH Final Report:

www.nasdse.org/project_search_doc2.pdf

►Completed State Primers:HI: http://doe.k12.hi.us/specialeducation/index_topics.htmID: http://www.sde.state.id.us/SPECIALEDMD: http://marylandpublicschools.org/MSDE/programs/charter_schools

► Project Intersect:

www.education.umd.edu/Depts/EDSP/ProjectIntersect