May 2021 Special Education Newsletter

Special Education May 2021 Newsletter

SEPAC Awards and Video

Thank you so much to SEPAC for hosting a wonderful event yesterday where 57 teachers were honored based on parent nominations.  SEPAC also shared this 2021 SEPAC Appreciation Award Recipient video that highlights each of the educators.  Special thanks to CCHS student Tate Becker for editing the video.

Department of Elementary and Secondary Education Tiered Focus Monitoring Report

DESE recently conducted a review of all of special education as part of their Tiered Focus Monitoring process.  The State’s Department of Elementary and Secondary Education recently completed a comprehensive review of the District’s special education efforts and did not have a single recommendation for improvement or change in practice.  The full report is found here.

Hearing Decision

We very much value and enjoy our partnerships with parents.  On rare occasion, the schools and parents do agree on the best path forward for a student and so we follow the process outlined by regulation.  In the one case involving our schools, a decision was recently published.  Special education hearings are not a win and lose situation but simply a method to determine next steps.  It is important to note that the hearing officer in this case stated that our district demonstrated its commitment to the student by devoting substantial expertise, creativity and resources to educating him/her and that Concord staff members who participated in the matter were forthright, candid, sophisticated, and obviously invested in the student.

Unified Track

For the first time, the CCHS spring season includes a Unified Track team where both special education and general education students are teammates.  We look forward to sharing more information as this team gets off the ground.

Special Education Program Overview

The Joint School Committees heard an overview of all of the districts’ special education programs on April 13.  The recording of the meeting is found here.  The slides from the presentation are also posted on the Special Education webpage here.

School Committee Presentation- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FW1hSsOWLAY&t=3409s hour 2:09

Slides- https://www.concordps.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/SC.April_.13.2021-1.pdf

Parent Survey

Last week, a survey for special education parents was distributed by email to all special education parents.  Your feedback is important to us.  The survey will remain open until May 13, 2021.

Special Education Parent Coffee

Special education parents are invited to a virtual coffee on May 19, 2021 at 9 am.  Please watch for an email with the zoom link.

Ruth Grube, Director of Student Services