Welcome back! The Dawg hopes that each of you enjoyed a splendid long weekend in celebration of our country’s birthday.  Now, it’s back to work.  So let’s take a look at SB 1153—a bill that is likely to have a significant impact on how you do business.

This one is further fallout from the statewide controversy over T.E.A.’s monitoring standard in the PBMAS that targeted any district that identified more than 8.5% of its kids in special education. That PBMAS standard is now gone.  T.E.A. pulled it down when the flak reached a tipping point.  Then the legislature piled on with SB 160, which prohibits T.E.A. from ever doing anything like that again.

We also got this new bill.  It requires that you give notice to parents when you begin to provide “intervention strategies” that go beyond the first tier that is provided for all children.  In other words, when the student moves to a second tier on your RTI model.  This notice must include several components, including a description of what the “intervention strategy” is, and the data you’ve collected from the first tier. Moreover, this law will require a separate PEIMS code for students served 1) through Section 504 and 2) via “intervention strategies.” In short, this new bill formalizes and regulates pre-referral activities to a greater degree than in the past.

We think this bill will require campus administrators and special education staff to put together some new protocols and/or systems.  I don’t see how you can comply with this one without making your RTI/504/Pre-Referral/At Risk strategies and procedures a bit more formal and regulated than they have been in the past.

DAWG BONE: BE SURE EVERYONE UNDERSTANDS WHAT AN “INTERVENTION STRATEGY” IS. 

File this one under: LEGISLATION 2017

Tomorrow: Lege takes a slap at our school superintendents…