NJ Coalition for Special Education Funding Reform

Welcome to the New Jersey Coalition for Special Education Funding Reform website.

Here you’ll find current news and information regarding special education funding policy and implementation in New Jersey, and current activities of the Coalition in response to those developments.

For more information on the Coalition, please click here. For a list of the Coalition’s members, click here. For current issues the Coalition is addressing, please click here.

What’s Happening Now…

The Coalition for Special Education Funding Reform has asked each candidate for Governor of the State of New Jersey to respond to four questions concerning special education funding.

The Questions were:

1. In general, what is your vision of education in New Jersey and how does that vision reflect the needs of students with disabilities?

2. With respect to state funding, do you support a census model for funding special education?

3. Do you support a tiered model for funding special education?

4. Would you support a comprehensive study to examine the full costs of special education in New Jersey?

5. What quality indicators do you think need to be measured in special education?

Click here to read Jon Corzine’s response to these questions:

Click here to read Chris Christie’s response: (note - Christie elected not to address these questions, but rather, to send a short statement.)

The Coalition has invited candidates for Governor to respond to a series of questions about special education funding issues. Their answers will be posted to our site by Monday, October 5, 2009.

We asked Jon Corzine (D), Chris Christie (R) and Chris Daggett (I) to respond to these questions:

In general, what is your vision for education in New Jersey and how does that vision reflect the needs of student with disabilities?

With respect to state funding:

1. Do you support a census model of funding special education?
2. Do you support a tiered model of funding special education?
3. Would you support a comprehensive study to examine the full costs of special education in NJ?

Visit the site again in October for their responses.

New Jersey Education Commissioner Lucille Davy has invited stakeholders to meet with her in early October to discuss the Race to the Top, President Barack Obama’s $4 billion effort to improve education. The new money will go only to those states that use data effectively to reward effective teachers, to support teachers who are struggling, and when necessary, to replace teachers who are not up to the job.

To access the funds, New Jersey will have to determine an approach for measuring student growth, use this measure as part of a process for differentiating teacher effectiveness, and use the data to make decisions on evaluation, compensation, career advancement, and tenure. Student data are vital: States barring the use of student data in decisions about teacher and principal evaluation will not even be eligible for funds.

Read more about the Race to the Top

The Coalition is growing! We are pleased to welcome New Jersey Speech-Language-Hearing Association as our newest member.

NJSHA represents nearly 2,000 professionals in the field of audiology and speech-language pathology, more than half of whom work in public or private schools.

The New Jersey Department of Education has published new “fiscal accountability” regulations (N.J.A.C. 6A:23A). These rules are intended to reduce costs, encourage efficiencies and push smaller districts to consolidate services. The rules include language that affects special education. In an effort to reduce placement in less restrictive programs, the regulations require local child study teams to inform the Executive County Superintendent any time they are considering an out-of-district placement. The county office will then provide the CST with information about programs opertated in other local districts that may be appropriate. If the CST determines that none of the programs suggested by the ECS are appropriate, the CST must write to the ECS to inform the ECS of their decision. Click here for the draft rules.

Misinformation and confusion about this role already is causing students with disabilities to be deprived of timely and appropriate services and placements. Many parents are being directly or indirectly told that the County must approve their child’s out-of-district placement. Students are being unilaterally pulled back into district programs which may or may not be appropriate. IEPs are being re-written and scaled back (i.e. fewer related services, shorter extended school year programs, shared para-professionals, consultative related services instead of 1:1) to offer a lower level of service available in a local district program.

In response to advocacy by Coalition members and their constituents, the legislature recently asked the Commissioner of the Department of Education to send a memo to school administrators and business officials and Directors of Special Education to clarify the rules. In that memo, she wrote that the regulations…

“…have no requirement for the ECS to review, recommend, approve, deny or overturn a determination of placement made by the Individualized Education Program (IEP) team…”

And…

“…the responsibility for determining the placement of a student with disabilities remains the sole responsibility of the IEP team, including the parent.”

The new rules do not limit the program options available for consideration by IEP teams. The Commissioner stressed that…

“the continuum of program options remains available for consideration by the IEP team,”

and the Commissioner stated that…

“The Executive County Office of Education is not charged to make a finding of noncompliance or to take any sanction against the local district when the IEP team determines that an in-district program is not the appropriate placement.”

For a copy of the Commissioner’s letter, please click here.

NJDOE has scheduled public hearings on the rules. Please click here for more information.

For a copy of the Coalition’s comments please click here.

Please share this information as widely as possible with parents, special educators, and school administrators.