SIGnetwork: January 2024

The Minnesota SPDG has the goal of increasing graduation rates of American Indian students with disabilities. They take a three-pronged approach: (1) the project supports Check and Connect, an evidence-based mentoring approach, in schools serving American Indian students with disabilities; (2) they support the recruitment and development of American Indian teachers; and (3) and provide support to Minnesota’s parent information and technical assistance center - PACER Center – to partner with and improve engagement with the families of American Indian students with disabilities. The State graduation rate for American Indian students with disabilities has increased from 48.9% (SY 2019-2020) to 53.0% (SY 2021-2022).

Experimental Evidence on the Robustness of Coaching Supports in Teacher Education

From the abstract: “Many novice teachers learn to teach “on the job,” leading to burnout and attrition among teachers and negative outcomes for students in the lg term. Preservice teacher education is tasked with optimizing teacher readiness, but there is a lack of causal evidence regarding effective ways to prepare new teachers.”

The researchers used a mixed-reality simulation platform, Mursion, to evaluate the causal effects and robustness of an individualized, brief, and highly directive coaching model for candidates enrolled in a university-based teacher education program.

The takeaway: The researchers found that short, targeted, and directive coaching significantly improves candidates’ instructional performance during simulated classroom sessions and that coaching effects were robust across different teaching tasks, study timing, and modes of delivery.

Julie Cohen, Anandita Krishnamachari, Vivian C. Wong, and Steffen Erickson, “Experimental Evidence on the Robustness of Coaching Supports in Teacher Education,” Educational Researcher (December 2023).

High-Quality Professional Development from the Council of Chief State School Officers CCSSO

States interested in developing strategies to increase the adoption of high-quality instructional materials should increase the number of teachers statewide who participate in high-quality professional development (HQPD) that is grounded in the skillful use of high-quality instructional materials.

The Importance of Instructionally Focused Professional Learning: This brief provides a research-based summary of what is known about high-quality professional learning that helps educators better plan and carry out instruction, resulting in student success. It also discusses how states can align teacher learning across the continuum from educator preparation through in-service support and explores various metrics for understanding and monitoring professional learning, including access, implementation, quality and efficacy.

Guidance for States on Supporting District Use of High-Quality Professional Learning Providers: CCSSO’s Guidance for States on Supporting District Use of High-Quality Professional Learning Providers was developed to provide states with information, tools, samples, and templates to streamline the process of supporting districts in selecting and using high-quality (HQ) professional learning (PL) providers. In this context, “high-quality” PL providers are organizations that support districts with professional learning that is, at minimum, content-specific, and often that is specific to the curriculum the district is implementing.

State examples and guidance:

• Rhode Island’s Educator Support Network: The Rhode Island Educator Support Network is a resource that aims to provide high quality professional learning opportunities to educators that center the whole child and is anchored in research and best professional practices. It includes many vendors that offer curriculum connected professional development.
• Delaware’s Professional Learning Partner Guide: The Delaware Professional Learning Partner Guide is a list of partner organizations that have exhibited expertise around professional learning and coaching—especially professional learning connected to curriculum. Their supports extend to encompass multiple stakeholders including classroom teachers, school leaders, and district leaders in their efforts to provide high quality instruction to students.
• Professional Learning Partner Guide: Rivet Education’s Professional Learning Partner Guide (PLPG) is a curated list of national and local professional learning providers that have the expertise to support the adoption and implementation of high-quality instructional materials (HQIM). The PLPG serves as an important resource for school, district, and state leaders who are eager to invest in support that is most likely to improve teaching and learning across their system. Each organization featured in the guide has undergone a thorough review process by a trained team of educators from across the country. The guide includes details such as the types of services each organization provides, the HQIM they support, clients with whom they are best suited to work, and how their professional learning promotes culturally responsive instruction.

New! From the US Department of Education: English Learner Family Toolkit

The Minnesota SPDG’s Parent Center partner, PACER, is engaged in meaningful activities to create community connections, provide advocacy and support, strengthen family knowledge, and invest in the work for indigenous students who have disabilities:

Creating Community Connections via school Powwows and meeting with the Indian Health Board of Minneapolis.

Providing Advocacy and Support via district open house events, conferences, and 1:1 advocacy and support to Native families.

Strengthening Family Knowledge via statewide presentations (“Your Role, Your Rights, Your Voice: Understanding Special Education to Support Your Native American Child Family”), resource development (“A Family Guide to Understanding Special Education”), and parent empowerment.

Investing in the Work via direct work with districts, monthly meetings, and building PACER’s capacity to serve Indian Country.

Maximizing the Benefits of the Strategic Planning for Continued Recovery (SPCR) Initiative

What is the SPCR Initiative?

The SPCR initiative aims to support state educational agencies (SEAs) as they sustain effective programs funded by ESSER/ESF. If you are an SEA looking to continue prioritizing investments through financial planning to ensure access and opportunities for all, the SPCR is for you.

The SPCR focuses on supporting SEAs to implement six strategies: (1) Determine impact of investments; (2) Prioritize efforts for recovery & transformation; (3) Achieve sustainability through financial planning; (4) Ensure access & opportunity for all; (5) Communicate impact of investments; (6) Support/sustain systemic capacity building. Applying five existing levers SEAs use to engage with LEAs: 1) Grantmaking; 2) Monitoring; 3) Policies; 4) Technical Assistance; 5) Partnerships.

Through the SPCR, States can participate in a variety of capacity-building supports, including:

• A webinar series - attend live or watch a recording (January 11, February 1, April 4, May 2 at 4pm ET);
• Opportunities to learn from and share with other SEAs-and join the Cross-SEA Collaboration Sessions;
• Individualized consultations with SPCR initiative content experts to get support on the challenges your SEA is having; and
• Videos and tools on the the SPCR | Comprehensive Center Network (compcenternetwork.org) webpage.

SEAs will not incur any costs for participating in this initiative and will have the opportunity to work with SPCR content experts to tailor the supports to their specific needs.

The National Comprehensive Center (NCC) and the U.S. Department of Education (ED) want to learn more about your efforts to support sustainability of effective ESSER/ESF investments and what additional supports you seek related to the six SPCR strategies noted above. Please complete this short survey to inform the content for the Cross-SEA Collaboration Sessions and individualized consultations.

OSEP has released 10 new 2021-22/ 2022 data files on ED’s Open Data Platform. For ease of navigation, please refer to OSEP’s IDEA Section 618 Data Products website to access the data files. The “Resources” tab for each collection provides the data notes and data file documentation.

•  SY 2021-22 Part B Assessment
• SY 2022-23 Part B Child Count and Educational Environments
• SY 2021-22 Part B Discipline
• SY 2021-22 Part B Dispute Resolution
• SY 2021-22 Part B Exiting
• FFY 2021/ SY 2021-22 LEA MOE Reduction and CEIS
• SY 2021-22 Part B Personnel
• 2022-23 Part C Child Count and Settings
• 2021-22 Part C Dispute Resolution
• 2021-22 Part C Exiting

As a reminder, the IDEA Section 618 data are displayed and published in user-friendly forms in:

The Annual Report to Congress  & OSEP Fast Facts

If you have any questions, please contact OSEP’s Research to Practice (RTP) Data Team at osepIDEAdata@ed.gov .

The School Leadership Show – Let’s Get Math Instruction Right

Biden-Harris Administration Announces Updated Resource to Support the Inclusion of Children with Disabilities in Early Childhood Programs

The U.S. Department of Education and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services today announced the release of an updated joint-policy statement on supporting the inclusion of children with disabilities in early childhood programs. The joint statement sets the expectation that inclusion continues as a child transitions into elementary school, emphasizes the need to increase public awareness and understanding of the science that supports inclusion of children with disabilities in early childhood programs and reinforces the legal foundations that support inclusion. 

The HHS-ED Policy Statement on the Inclusion of Children with Disabilities in Early Childhood Programs includes a renewed commitment and urgency, as children with disabilities continue to face barriers accessing and fully participating in inclusive early childhood programs.