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Supporting Students with Disabilities
For All to Mean All, It Has to Mean Each: For all students to succeed, each student must have access to the resources and educational rigor they need regardless of background.
We are committed to prioritizing equity in our work to support states. Such a commitment to students with disabilities, including students with the most significant cognitive disabilities, must focus on both high expectations for each student and the supports each student needs in order to achieve those expectations.
Partnerships to Improve Outcomes for Students with Disabilities
We partner with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) to support states in their efforts to improve outcomes for students with disabilities.
CEEDAR Center (Collaboration for Effective Educators Development, Accountability and Reform) We are partnered with the CEEDAR Center, which is funded by OSEP. CEEDAR is dedicated to supporting states in their efforts to develop teachers and leaders who can successfully prepare students with disabilities to achieve college and career-ready standards.
National Center for Systemic Improvement (NCSI) We are partnered with NCSI, which is also funded by OSEP. NCSI assists states in building capacity to support school districts and local early intervention programs to improve outcomes for children with disabilities, and helps states achieve a national vision of results-driven accountability for special education and early intervention programs.
High-Quality Educator Preparation and Development for Students with Disabilities
Through its partnership with CEEDAR, CCSSO is committed to supporting states in improving pre-service and in-service educator training for the success of diverse learners.
The CEEDAR Center helps states, Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs), and Local Education Agencies (LEAs) create professional learning systems that provide teachers and leaders with effective opportunities to learn how to improve core and specialized instruction in inclusive settings for students with disabilities. Together with CEEDAR, we are working to coordinate and leverage their efforts and resources in states that are engaged in initiatives in both organizations.
A Coordinated and Collaborative Approach to Service Delivery
In 2017, we launched the National Collaborative on Inclusive Principal Leadership (NCIPL), a coalition of diverse organizations working to support states in their efforts to strengthen principal preparation and ongoing professional learning for the success of students with disabilities and others who struggle to learn in school. NCIPL focuses on three core levers—principal preparation, principal professional learning, and school improvement—for bolstering principals’ capacity to lead effective inclusive schools that support the needs of each student.
Resources to Promote Equity for Students with Disabilities
We are committed to providing states with resources to assist in their equity-focused work on educator development.
In 2017, together with CEEDAR, we released PSEL 2015 and Promoting Principal Leadership for the Success of Students with Disabilities, a supplementary guidance document to the Professional Standards for Educational Leaders that states can use to ensure that all principals are equipped to lead effective inclusive schools. This document serves as the foundation for the work of the National Collaborative on Inclusive Principal Leadership (NCIPL) described above.
In 2015, we also released Promises to Keep: Transforming Educator Preparation to Better Serve a Diverse Range of Learners together with CEEDAR. The document outlines policy actions that states can take to ensure that their preparation programs are more effective for students with disabilities.
A National Vision of Results-Driven Accountability for Students with Disabilities
We are committed to supporting states in improving outcomes for students with disabilities through a Learning Collaboratives technical assistance model.
Through NCSI, each state is implementing a State Systemic Improvement Plan (SSIP), which defines an area of focus for supporting students with disabilities. The goal is to improve educational results and outcomes for children with disabilities, and, as such, becomes a critical leverage point in states' comprehensive efforts to close opportunity and achievement gaps and ensure readiness for college, career, and life readiness for all students. One major way NCSI, CCSSO and other partners are supporting states in these efforts is through a Learning Collaboratives technical assistance model, a network of shared leadership and peer support where states can learn from experts in the field and colleagues across the country. A brief description of each Learning Collaborative can be found here.