Legislature(2013 - 2014)BELTZ 105 (TSBldg)
01/23/2013 08:00 AM Senate EDUCATION
| Audio | Topic |
|---|---|
| Start | |
| SB17 | |
| Presentation: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (stem) Education in Alaska, First Robotics-stem Alaska | |
| Adjourn |
* first hearing in first committee of referral
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
| + | TELECONFERENCED | ||
| *+ | SB 17 | TELECONFERENCED | |
SB 17-EXTEND SPECIAL EDUCATION SERVICE AGENCY
8:00:10 AM
CHAIR STEVENS announced the consideration of SB 17, "An Act
extending the special education service agency; and providing
for an effective date." He said the Special Education Service
Agency (SESA) was scheduled to sunset on. He explained that the
sunset date was July 1, 2013 and it was imminent for the
committee to decide if SESA should be extended. He noted that
the committee would also address whether SESA belonged in the
Department of Education & Early Development (DEED) or under the
Governor's Council on Disabilities & Special Education (GCDSE).
8:01:16 AM
CHAIR STEVEN called a brief at ease from 8:01:16 a.m. to 8:01:42
a.m.
TIM LAMKIN, staff to Senator Stevens, Alaska State Legislature,
introduced SB 17 and noted that the bill essentially extended
SESA's sunset to 2021. He explained that there were three
underlying issues for the committee to decide: the importance of
SESA to extend the sunset, consolidating SESA into DEED, leaving
SESA in the Department of Health & Social Services (DHSS), and
addressing SESA funding issues.
8:03:06 AM
PATRICK PILLAI, Executive Director, Special Education Service
Agency, introduced and presented a five minute video on the
services provided by SESA.
8:06:01 AM
SENATOR GARDNER joined the committee meeting.
8:10:34 AM
MR. PILLAI presented an overview of the Special Education
Service Agency (SESA) as follows:
Special Education Service Agency (SESA) Mission:
· SESA provides consultation and training to
support the unique educational needs of
individuals and the Alaskan communities that
serve them.
SESA Background:
· Created in 1986; formed as a not-for-profit
Corporation.
· Governed by the Alaska Governor's Council on
Disabilities and Special Education.
· Receive Low Incidence Disabilities funding
through DEED based on prior year's statewide
total enrollment.
· Receives grant funding from State & Federal
sources, (DHHS and DEED): Alaska Autism Resource
Center, Alaska Deaf-Blind Grant, Bring the Kids
Home Transition Initiative, Guiding and
Instructing New Special Education Teachers Grant.
SESA Staff:
· Brenda Jager, SESA vision specialist, just
completing her dissertation for a doctoral
program in vision impairment from the University
of Arizona. She has been with SESA for 14 years.
AS 14.30.630(b)(1) requires SESA to provide the
following special education services:
· (A) Itinerant outreach services to students who
are deaf, deaf-blind, mentally retarded, hearing
impaired, blind and visually impaired,
orthopedically disabled, health-impaired in other
ways, and severely emotionally disturbed, and to
students with multiple disabilities;
· (B) Special education instructional support and
training of local school district special
education personnel; and
· (C) Other services appropriate to special
education needs.
8:12:51 AM
MR. PILLAI said that itinerant outreach services are provided
throughout the state. He explained that support and training
included: on-site, in-service for teachers and paraprofessionals
for entire grade levels or schools. He noted that SESA recently
completed training for: 245 paraprofessionals in the MATSU
District, 56 special education teachers in Fairbanks, and the
Bering Strait School District's educational aides met in
Unalakleet to receive full scale training on positive behavioral
support. He said SESA provided other services through grants
that applied to autism and deaf-blind children. He noted that
special projects included the creation of modules for the
disability trainings on the DEED website.
8:14:06 AM
He referenced a SESA map that showed the 45 Alaska schools
districts that were provided with services. He explained that
SESA services included on-site training where specialists travel
to school districts to assist with programming and in-service
training. He said SESA collaborated with the [Alaska Native
Medical Center] in Anchorage if a child required hearing aids or
medical treatment. He stated that SESA served 260 low incident
disability students with the total increasing annually.
He continued to provide a SESA overview as follows:
SESA Staff:
· Meriah Cory, Multiple Disabilities Specialist,
was a graduate of Montana State University and a
Peace Corps volunteer in Kazakhstan. Meriah
contacted SESA and asked to work with the
organization because it was similar to what she
was doing in Kazakhstan. She has been with SESA
for one year.
SESA Services:
· On-site consultation: observations of classrooms,
modeling of teaching strategies, modeling of
evidence based strategies.
· In-service training for professional development.
· Alaska State Special Education Conference
(ASSEC).
· Specific courses designed and offered for
university credit.
· Alaska Deaf Education Advisory Board.
· Governor's Council/Education/Rural Education.
· DEED-Specific Grants-AARC/BTKH/DSI.
· Other Non-profits-Stone Soup/Center for Human
Development/ILP.
· Distance Education.
MR. PILLAI said on-site consulting was the preferred method
of training by teachers and paraprofessionals. He explained
that the best-case scenario involved specialists teaching
classes and allowing teachers and paraprofessionals to
observe modeling of behaviors and strategies.
He said in-service training was the main thrust for SESA.
He noted that 15 SESA specialists were doing presentations
at the upcoming Alaska State Special Education Conference
(ASSEC), the main professional development conference
session in Alaska. He disclosed that ASSEC was chaired by
Patricia McDaid, SESA-Education Specialist/Coordinator. He
noted that Dr. McDaid received her Ph.D. in autism from the
University of Boston.
He said SESA's specific course designed programs assisted
school districts in meeting their obligation for recording
of professional development through on-site training and
partnering with universities: Alaska Pacific University,
University of Alaska-Anchorage, University of Alaska-
Fairbanks, and University of Alaska-Southeast. He said an
example would be if an individual was hired as an
interpreter in rural Alaska, SESA would put in the training
for the individual to sign and communicate if a district
did not have funds for out-of-state instruction. He noted
that the Special Education Handbook specified that an
individual hired in the previously mentioned capacity must
be elevated from "novice" to "advanced" within a certain
period of time. He said SESA was the entity that provided
the training and collaboration with the Alaska State School
for Deaf and Hard of Hearing for teachers to take the
Science Communication Proficiency Interview (SCPI).
MR. PILLAI said SESA was part of the Alaska Deaf Advisory
Board and provided a standard of education mandated by
national forums for deaf education.
He said SESA's governorship was done through GCDSE. He
explained that SESA worked on different platforms regarding
rural education and education. He noted that SESA
participated to receive feedback from communities to
elevate deaf education standards.
He said two SESA specialists were training with the Center
for Human Development for the Board Certified Behavioral
Analyst (BCBA) endorsement. He said the GAINS Grant was the
the Guiding and Instructing New Special Education Teachers
at the preschool level. He explained that the Stone Soup
Group had the community component and SESA had the
educational component.
He stated that SESA had a Video Control Center (VCC) for
video transmissions, Skype™, and [video] modules for school
district access.
8:19:12 AM
MR. PILLAI said SESA worked on its website to provide a resource
for rural Alaska. He explained that the SESA website was
designed without excessive color or graphics to allow
accessibility for individuals with screen reading disabilities.
He noted that the SESA website allowed special education
directors to download all of the referral forms required to
access SESA services. He said the SESA website provided
referrals, grant information, and direct access to specific
services for low incidence disabilities.
He detailed the FY12 Student Consultation by District graphic
display and noted the 45 districts that SESA was providing
services to. He explained that a lot of the consultation was
dependent on the size of district, the number of referrals, and
the number of students with disabilities.
MR. PILLAI continued to provide a SESA overview as follows:
SESA Staff:
· Andrea Story, Education Specialist-Vision
Impairment, has been working 22 years for SESA.
Impact on Students & Teachers:
· Reduced ability to promote evidenced based
practices.
· Fewer on-site visits to provide targeted
interventions.
· Shorter visits to maximize travel dollars to
include more sites.
· Less time for classroom observation and program
enhancement.
· Loss of guidance to new special education
teachers and to classroom teachers encountering
unique disabilities.
· Loss of child specific educational intervention
strategies modeled on-site to teachers.
· Reduced ability to recruit quality specialists to
Alaska.
MR. PILLAI said the impact on students and teachers for non-
reauthorization of SESA, the main three areas goes back to
session laws that created SESA in 1986 and those are:
1. Provision of services to raise the standard of special
education services in school districts.
2. Collaboration between school districts to elevate special
education specifically for kids with low incidence
disabilities.
3. Provision of SESA specialists to meet the needs of a free
and appropriate education.
He noted that targeted interventions stood out as being one of
the most important SESA practices. He explained that targeted
interventions pertained to the efficiency in elevating a child
through an instructional media from a functional level to a
higher level of functioning. He said an example of the expertise
required by teachers related to a situation where an on-site
special education teacher was not well versed in sign language
and misinterpreted a student as having multiple disabilities. He
said another example occurred when a special education teacher
informed him that a student was reading a novel, but the student
was actually not retaining the material due to the teacher's
lack of work with profoundly deaf children. He explained that
special education teachers with special education credentials
may not have worked with a particular disability. He noted a
waiver program was enacted to address a shortage of special
education teachers where individuals with general education
backgrounds were working in special education without expertise
with disabled students. He said specialists from SESA or
different organizations were important to special education
teachers.
MR. PILLIA said guidance for new special education teachers was
an important SESA service. He cited an example of a new teacher
who did not realize that a student required a simple medical
procedure prior to being fitted for a hearing aid.
He explained that the ability to recruit quality specialists was
imperative in order to provide on-site special education
teachers with a highly qualified instructor.
8:25:43 AM
CHAIR STEVENS asked what would happen if the legislature did not
act and the sunset process was invoked. He called attention to a
second question and asked if SESA dealt with private schools.
MR. PILLAI answered that if SESA was not reauthorized by July 1,
operations would begin to shut the program down within a one
year time period.
CHAIR STEVENS assessed that a shutdown process would divert
attention and make SESA less effective.
MR. PILLAI answered yes. He said SESA would not be able to meet
the demands of the school districts in providing services. He
emphasized that specialists would immediately be looking for
other jobs once a shutdown was announced.
He addressed Chair Stevens' second question regarding private
schools and explained that SESA worked with any school that had
a public school teacher who provided program oversight.
8:28:02 AM
SENATOR DUNLEAVY asked if SESA followed the teacher and not the
student. He inquired if a child in a private or home school
program would be dependent on receiving SESA support through a
special education teacher.
MR. PILLAI answered correct. He noted that SESA had not provided
services to home schools. He reiterated that SESA would provide
support if a public school teacher was involved with oversight.
He explained that SESA did observations with the intent of
elevating local capacity. He clarified that a SESA specialist
worked with a student while a special education teacher
observed.
SENATOR DUNLEAVY asked if SESA's services were mandated.
MR. PILLAI answered yes. He explained that a statute mentioned
itinerant services and professional development. He clarified
that SESA provided itinerant services when a referral was
received from a special education teacher who required
assistance with a student. He said a SESA specialist would
provide three to five days of assistance to special education
teachers, paraprofessionals and students.
SENATOR GARDNER addressed SESA's distribution of services and
asked why Mat-Su and Anchorage received assistance from only
seven specialists. She noted that the Anchorage area accounted
for over half of Alaska's population.
MR. PILLAI answered that the larger school districts had their
own resources. He noted that paraprofessional training was not
counted as on-site consultation. He explained that SESA only
provided Anchorage with on-site consultation for deaf-blind
students.
SENATOR GARDNER asked Mr. Pillai to address the shortage in
special education teachers.
MR. PILLAI responded that there were approximately 70 unfilled
positions for special education teachers during the previous
year. He noted a study from the University of Alaska-Fairbanks
that showed 38 percent of special education teachers did not
know what the expected job stress levels were. He said there was
a high need for qualified special education teachers and SESA's
support was an important facet to assist in addressing the wide
array of disabilities.
8:32:35 AM
ERIC GEBHART, Chair, Governor's Council on Disabilities and
Special Education (GCDSE), stated that it would be hard to
retain specialists if SESA was allowed to sunset. He noted that
contracts would have to be offered to tenured teachers by March
15. He explained that SESA specialists really were specialists
that were highly sought after to do other things. He said SESA
would like to give their specialists every confidence to sign
their contracts and stay. He emphasized that SESA did not want
to lose the great teaching resources that they had.
8:34:53 AM
MR. GEBHART addressed the importance to fund the SESA services
that were provided to schools, parents, students, and
communities.
He addressed the issue regarding SESA's governance and noted
that the committee had three options to consider: maintain
multi-department oversight, move SESA entirely under DEED, or
allow DHSS to direct funding to SESA. He explained that he felt
the current structure for SESA worked. He said the committee
should be aware that DEED was currently not structured to govern
SESA.
8:38:05 AM
CHAIR STEVENS pointed out that SESA specialists were required to
travel and noted that a special person was required for the job.
MR. GEBHART replied yes.
SENATOR GARDNER addressed SESA's governance and asked that for
Mr. Gebhart to clarify departmental oversight.
MR. GEBHART explained that one of the five responsibilities for
GCDSE was being the SESA board. He said GCDSE consisted of nine
people that did the actual work of the board, five council
members, Don Enoch-DEED Special Education Coordinator, a Council
of Administrators of Special Education (CASE) representative, a
School Administrators Association representative, and a National
Education Association-Alaska (NEA-Alaska) special education
representative. He said SESA emphasis in serving rural areas
dictated that the majority of council members were either based
in rural areas or had experience in rural areas. He stated that
he believed GCDSE's current structure for SESA worked. He
referred to a legislative audit that reported that maintaining
SESA within the current governance structure would require GCDSE
to be intentional in their communications.
CHAIR STEVENS noted that the audit report that Mr. Gehart
mentioned suggested that the legislature review SESA's
governance. He explained that the auditors did not specify how
or what the legislature should address. He said the committee
would consider the three governance options that Mr. Gehart had
presented.
8:41:27 AM
SENATOR HUGGINS asked Mr. Gebhart what, outside of funding, he
would do to fine tune SESA.
MR. GEBHART replied that he would increase SESA's capacity to
provide assistance from a distance.
SENATOR GARDNER noted SESA's static-funding for the past 14
years. She asked if the number of students served by SESA
changed, the amount of service to each student changed, and if
SESA had a wait-list.
MR. GEBHART replied that SESA did not have a wait-list. He
explained that SESA served when called to serve. He noted that
SESA had decreased the number of specialist visits due to the
cost of travel. He said SESA had fewer specialists than it used
to have and the number of students was continuing to increase.
SENATOR GARDNER asked if students were being less served by SESA
because of fewer staff members, more students, and less travel
by specialists.
MR. GEBHART answered yes.
8:44:49 AM
MILLIE RYAN, Executive Director, REACH Incorporated, said she
was a former executive director for GCDSE. She addressed SESA's
governance structure history and noted that GCDSE was chosen due
to its special education advisory role to the legislature,
governor, and DEED. She agreed that maintaining GCDSE as the
governing council required legislative review. She noted SESA's
valuable role in training REACH staff members to assist blind
and deaf individuals with developmental disabilities. She
explained that SESA's services outside of school districts were
often overlooked.
8:48:14 AM
LES MORSE, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Education and
Early Development, introduced himself.
ELIZABETH NUDELMAN, Director, School Finance & Facilities,
Department of Education and Early Development, introduced
herself.
CHAIR STEVENS asked for comments on SB 17 and the auditor's
findings in regards to SESA.
MR. MORSE replied that he would address the ongoing confusion of
the governance structure and budgeting for SESA. He said DEED
had not felt any confusion with SESA's governance. He explained
that some of the confusion could be attributed to SESA's
funding. He noted that DEED was clear with the auditors that the
history of SESA's funding was legislatively driven. He said AS
14.30.650 specifically stated that the legislature would make
appropriations and not DEED. He explained that DEED allocated
funds and the legislature appropriated funds. He said
appropriation was a decision and allocation was executed based
upon a plan or budget. He disclosed that DEED did not
necessarily suggest changes to SESA's governance or budgeting
and noted that changes came through legislation. He noted his
perplexity to the confusion with SESA when representatives from
SESA testified last legislative session and addressed their
governance and budgeting process.
He addressed SESA' governance and noted that DEED was not
structured to take on SESA's governance. He explained that DEED
would require infrastructure change to govern SESA. He stated
that it was important for DEED to continue to work closely with
GCDSE and SESA. He said communication had improved over the past
two years.
He referenced a statement that DEED's Special Education
Administrator's title and role changed. He clarified that the
Special Education Administrator's title and role did not change.
He noted that the Special Education Administrator attended all
of SESA's meetings.
8:51:44 AM
CHAIR STEVENS asked for Ms. Nudelman's thoughts on SESA.
MS. NUDELMAN replied that she concurred with Mr. Morse's
comments and enjoyed communicating with SESA.
8:53:21 AM
BRUCE JOHNSON, Ph.D., Executive Director, Alaska Council of
School Administrators (ACSA), said ACSA saw SESA as an important
ingredient to their success in Alaska. He explained that it was
the school districts' obligation to meet the needs of students
with low incidence disabilities. He said he believed that SESA
provided the educational services to students with multiple
disabilities in a more cost effective way than individual school
districts.
8:55:01 AM
CHAIR STEVENS stated that the committee faced the issues of
extending SESA's sunset and following the audit's recommendation
to address governance.
[SB 17 was held in committee.]
| Document Name | Date/Time | Subjects |
|---|---|---|
| 01232013_SB17_SESA_LegAudit_Report.pdf |
SEDC 1/23/2013 8:00:00 AM |
SB 17 |
| 01232013_SB17_SESA Powerpoint_Policy.pdf |
SEDC 1/23/2013 8:00:00 AM |
SB 17 |
| 01232013_SB17_SESA_position paper.pdf |
SEDC 1/23/2013 8:00:00 AM |
SB 17 |
| 01232013_SB17_SESA_Fiscal Note.pdf |
SEDC 1/23/2013 8:00:00 AM |
SB 17 |
| 01212013_SB17_SESA_SupportLetter1.pdf |
SEDC 1/23/2013 8:00:00 AM |
SB 17 |
| 01232013_SB17_SESA_SupportLetter2.pdf |
SEDC 1/23/2013 8:00:00 AM |
SB 17 |
| 01232013_STEM_AK_EconomicTrends.pdf |
SEDC 1/23/2013 8:00:00 AM |
STEM Presentation |
| 01232013_STEM_PresentationSlides.pdf |
SEDC 1/23/2013 8:00:00 AM |
STEM Presentation |
| 01232013_STEM_WhitePaper.pdf |
SEDC 1/23/2013 8:00:00 AM |
STEM Presentation |