Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Rep. Emilie Kornheiser (Chair, House Ways and Means Committee)]: Hello. We are here in a joint hearing of House Education and House Ways and Beans. Last week, we were together in this room to hear from Education on their special education report, and we did not have enough time to hear from the Vermont Council on Special Education, and so they very graciously and gracefully offered to come this week. Thank you for that. And sorry for the time from last week. But really glad to have you here today. Laura, it's yours, however you want to organize yourselves.

[Erin McGuire (Essex Westford School District; Past President, VCSEA)]: We have an order. We're going to start with Mary. Mary, why don't you go ahead?

[Mary Lundin (Executive Director, VCSEA)]: Good afternoon, chair Kornheiser, chair Conlin, and members of the committee. Thank you for meeting with us today. My name is Mary Lundin, and I serve as executive director of the Vermont Council of Special Education Administrators. My perspective is grounded in a career dedicated to Vermont students at every level, having served as a special educator, a special ed administrator, and a superintendent. My colleagues and I are here today to testify on the intersection of act 73 in special education. We will also provide additional perspective regarding the agency of education's recent joint testimony and offer further insights into the current state of special education in Vermont. For over forty four years, VCSEA has served as the backbone of special education leadership in Vermont. We are the practitioners who bridge the gap between state policy and the daily realities of serving students with disabilities. To assist the committee's work this session, we have provided our twenty twenty six legislative priorities and a fact sheet on maintenance of effort, also known as MOE. At this time, I'm going to ask my colleague, Erin McGuire, to offer additional perspective on behalf of VCSEA regarding the testimony delivered by the Agency of Education last week.

[Erin McGuire (Essex Westford School District; Past President, VCSEA)]: Thanks, Mary. Hello to everyone. Thank you for having us. I'm Erin McGuire. I am the director of equity and inclusion and co director of student support services and instruction for the Essex Westford School District. I serve as the past president for the Vermont Council of Special Education Administrators, and I also serve as the past president for our National Organization of Special Education Administrators. As Mary had stated, our plan to testify in front of you started with an effort that we began in house education and wanted to extend ways and means related to maintenance of effort. A conversation about VCSEA's support of the Cooperative Education Service Agency design with some specific guardrails and understandings, as well as to have a brief conversation about the state of affairs of education leadership related to special ed in the state, which the agency began a conversation in their presentation. But after watching the presentation, and after being able to be here today, I actually wanted to start with something that I think we should always be starting with whenever we talk about individuals with disabilities, especially those of us who do not identify as such, and on this day of disability advocacy within the body today. So I just wanted to make clear that our students with disabilities in Vermont are an incredibly, beautifully diverse addition and part of our schools. They create superpowers and opportunities for each other, for our teachers, for other students to be part of an engagement that helps us understand the ways that we need to create education to ensure that they are fully accessible to all people who engage in those spaces. And that includes our staff as well. I also enter this conversation from that perspective with a little bit of a warning that when cost trends and numbers of students in particular disability categories guide our conversation, we sometimes miss that piece. And so I would encourage us all to hold the value of those we know who are most impacted by our conversation today, to ensure that their voices are part of this conversation. We want to make sure that students with disabilities are not perceived as too expensive. We want to make sure that identification of individuals with disabilities is a supportive framework and not a suspect framework about whether or not people should or should not be identified with disabilities. And that our focus on our burden as systems to ensure that we recognize our role and to make sure that systems serve them well and are designed from that perspective. I've had that conversation with many of you. Special education was put in place not as a discretionary program, but as something that was necessary in order to avoid future harms that have occurred in the past to individuals with disabilities in education space. And so it is from this place that we testify today related to this topic. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to put that on the front of all that we do. I wanted to first identify the areas of agreement that BCSEA holds and is represented in our platform that you have in front of you related to what the agency said when they testified last week. First is that Act 73 has not been fully implemented. We've been involved in this conversation with the agency for some time as VCSEA. And part of our platform, and one of my colleagues will speak more deeply to it, that we must finish what we start. We also agree that service continuums need strengthening, especially in rural contexts where there may be a lack of service available for students with disabilities. In the NSX Westford School District is very different than where I grew up in Rochester, Vermont, and what might be needed in that environment. We also wanted to agree, and actually, I think it's important to note that I think our testimony in Senate education helps spur us into a conversation with the agency that resulted in a slide in their deck about maintenance of effort. You heard Mary reference that at the beginning. My colleague, Chris Benwellyn, will speak to that more deeply. We also agree that the director of special education is essential to elevate that position with the agency. I'm going to speak a little bit more to the state of leadership in special education in a little bit. And we do agree that that position should have never been placed down into the lower levels of responsibility in the agency, and has a place in the Secretary's cabinet to help lead the 16% of investment that this state makes in education dollars to students with disabilities. And then we also agree that there is, in some places, a heavy reliance on contracted services in the state for special education that needs to be considered. We need to think about where that makes sense and where it doesn't. These are not binaries. This is not yes or no, but whether or not the current use of contracted services makes sense. And also the role in which independent therapeutic schools are playing in our continuum, valuing those and thinking about our future related to students who need separate schools that are therapeutically designed in order to meet their needs based on the IEP determinations. And lastly, we also agree that looking at the in school continuum, what's available in a school for students with higher level needs are something that we need to consider. I'd start with our places of agreement. I will share that there are some areas of concern. And part of this has to do with what we say and what we don't say. And the data that we elevate and the data that we don't. First, what I would say is an overarching worry about the report that was flagged by the CSEA in our policy sprint team that works to support the agency in the development of the report. If you review section 29 of Act 73, it's not that long. If you take a look at the questions that are in that section of the law that you all passed, the answers to the questions are not fully captured within the report. There were a number of missing pieces. I want to share that the reason from my perspective that those pieces are missing is because the agency indicated that they did not have the data, nor the capacity to gather the data necessary to answer the questions that were in Act 73 under Section 29. I agree with the agency that they do not have the expertise or the capacity to gather the information necessary. I do want you to know, though, that VCSEA spent a half a day in a retreat this summer developing a list of data points that we thought might be helpful under all ten secondtions of Section 29 to help the state think about how do we answer these questions. They are important questions to answer in order to understand how we do or do not shape policy in special education going forward. We also feel like there is missing information related to, from the presentation, related to the increase in special education costs over the last five years, to general education costs or all education costs. I want to notice a sentence in the report that recognized that special education from 2020 forward has risen 12%, and that total education expenses have risen 37% since then. That to me is actually pointing to an effort to keep increases down in special education. And I'm not sure it's fair to describe the special education as some substantial cost driver in education, given that one sentence that's in the report. I'm not sure why that doesn't show up in the dialogue as we unpack the report. But for me, it matters. It doesn't mean that we shouldn't look at efficiencies. It doesn't mean that 12% is fine. But what it does mean is that 12% is not 37%. And I wonder about where we need to focus in order to address rising cost. It is very important to VCSCA that we do not take the 800 students in Vermont who are our most vulnerable and most needy students and then try to describe them as part of the affordability problem in Vermont. It's not fair and it's not right. But it is part of what is happening, and we need your help, and we need the agency's help to make sure that that is not the narrative that we're creating. Now, what I would say is I don't think that was intentional on the agency's part. But I do think that when you click on the question at the end of the report where it asks for the cost drivers and you click, the only place it goes is to the extraordinary cost measure. That extraordinary cost is about 3% of the education spending. Again, our neediest population. They need us to support them. They need us to make sure the continuum is present to make their sure their needs are met. And so the presentation of that information feels important. I could go on about this issue, but I do think instead what it makes sense to do is to talk a little bit about our desire to get deeper into Section 29 of Act 73 in partnership with the agency to help unpack some of the concerns that we're sharing here today. Presenting data without meaning are just numbers. Counting students and counting dollars does not tend to result in reason why things are happening the way they are. And so if our agency is limited to counting students by disability category, counting students by district, and then how many dollars are spent, we are not likely to get to a real quality outcome that helps us think together as policymakers about what we need to do. And VCSEA stands ready to help with that. I'd like to shift my attention to some challenges that we're having related to special education leadership in Vermont. The agency mentioned the issues of an open position of a special education director in the state, and I'm grateful that they are elevating that position to an hourly rate that maybe will attract some folks who hold the expertise necessary to be a lead policy decision maker in special education in the state of Vermont. Our children deserve it. Our administration deserves it. You all deserve it. And I'm hopeful that we will find someone. Have had five different directors since 2017. There are many reasons why those directors have resigned. I could go into that. I don't think that would be appropriate here. The last director left a few months ago. An interim was named and has resigned. The number of people working in the special education department at the agency, I'm not really sure of the number, but what I'm hearing is that it's about 50% of staff right now without key leadership positions. I think Secretary Saunders and Doctor. Davis are doing their best. Charter Schools USA is not a place where you would gain a high level of expertise in special education. I think she's doing her best to gain that expertise. She's leaning in, she's listening to us, she's talking with us. I'm not here to create finger pointing. Doctor. Davis has been incredibly collaborative with us trying to figure this out. I think the MOE issue coming forward is a great example of that. And I think they're being put a little bit in an impossible situation to respond to Section 29 of Act 73, given the current status of special education staffing at the agency I think the report reflects this. I think the framework of an action plan that was presented reflects this. I'm not sure what to ask for to help them. We stand ready to support whatever is necessary to be in support. I would like to share with you that I have spoken with disability advocacy communities, including the Vermont Family Network, as well as members of the state education advisory panel, who have similar concerns about voice, about engagement, about what is showing up as an outcome of those engagements from the work. And I think we need to reconvene, figure out how we're going to get you the information that you need to make good decisions. And in the meantime, I think we really need to be careful about cutting funding for special education. There are a couple of reasons for that, many of which I've already referenced. But there's also a legal reason not to do it, which my colleague is going to speak to. Lastly, I want you to know that a group of people, including some special education directors, parent advocates, individuals with disabilities have come together to do some development work on some possible bill language to support both the MOE issue, some needs around the guardrails related to Cooperative Education Service agencies. And you will be receiving that information over the next couple of days to see what that body of work is. I think when we do our work collectively, it makes a big difference. Instead of special education directors and teachers and disability rights advocates and individuals with disabilities sit separately, it makes much more sense for us to be together doing this work collectively. And it was incredibly powerful to be part of that group and find our way forward together in agreement on almost every issue. There may be only one outstanding that we didn't find our way to. But that information, I think, will be helpful. In order to make sure there's time for questions and my colleagues to present, I am going to go ahead now and turn the floor to Chris Fenway, who is here and is going to speak to MOE. This will be a little bit of a repeat for house education, although it doesn't seem like we can talk about this enough. Honestly, there's been a lot of confusion with legislators both on both sides of the aisle as we've had these conversations. So we are going to just speak to that, albeit more briefly than when we were presenting and how said thanks for having us.

[Chris Fenway (President, VCSEA; Director of Special Services, SVUVT/Slate Valley)]: Thank you, Erin. Good afternoon, I'm Chris Fenway and I'm president of VCSEA and director of special services for SVUVT, which is located in Fairhaven, Vermont. I have served in Vermont in special education as educator and an administrator for the last thirty four years. Also worked in community mental health and in higher education supporting teacher prep programs here in Vermont. And it's from that perspective and that experience and vantage point that I offer testimony on behalf of VCSEA. As Erin mentioned already, we're really appreciative of the time that you've committed to hearing our testimony today. Since we already have met with some of you, we're not gonna repeat the details of the previous testimony or about our concerns with regard to funding of special ed and the conversations about new funding formulas for special ed and new funding weights potentially for special ed. We spoke to that in our written testimony and the concerns there. So I'm not gonna go into detail other than to repeat or ask, as we know it's under study, that as waiting formulas are considered, we don't develop something is a weighted system based on disability. As Erin spoke to earlier, we do not want finance issues to be tied on the backs of students with disabilities, and we don't wanna create any competition for funds. So our legislative ask is that with regard to a weighting formula when options are considered, we do not look at a weighted system based on disability. We need a system that will allow districts to maintain their maintenance of effort and not create competition for funds between general education or a foundation formula and special education. MOE we spoke to earlier last week in a couple of different legislative bodies, and it's imperative that we have clear legislative oversight for the federal maintenance of effort requirements, it's essential. Without that proactive management, the state faces significant fiscal vulnerabilities. Vermont school districts could not afford to lose their federal funding and many could not operate absence of it. IDEA B, IDEA Part B general grant funds are allocated to school districts specifically for the use of supporting students with disabilities. A district is required to both budget for and spend the same amount of state and or local dollars from one year to the next, and districts are prohibited from using federal special ed dollars to reduce the amount of local or state money spent from one year to the next. It's referred to as a non supplanting rule in special education. And so as our state contemplates a potential third funding model for special ed in the last five years, MOE ensures that even if the method of funding changes, the total amount of financial support for students with disabilities does not drop. In other words, it provides a level of fiscal stability for LEAs to serve students with disabilities, with some limited exceptions that are identified in the handout that we provided. The MOE sheet that we included with our testimony goes into more detail about this fiscal requirement, but the sum and the bottom line is, is that if school districts do not meet MOE, they risk having to pay back federal dollars with non federal monies, and Vermont school districts cannot implement an effective system of education without having access to those federal dollars. The other area that I want to speak to about this afternoon, are the staffing ratios in Vermont. That's received a lot of attention. Vermont takes great pride in our inclusion of students with disabilities in general learning environments. We have some of the highest inclusion rates in the country with over eighty two percent of our students being included in general environments, 80% of the time or more in terms of being in general ed environments, and it's an area of great pride. It's far beyond that of the national average, which is in the high 60s, around 67%. However, we have to recognize that our success in inclusion or our ability to include students is not prefaced on our ability to create inclusive environments, but rather it's done through the use of paraeducators to support our most complex students. As a result, we have a high number of adults that are supporting students in our schools. This isn't new information. I'm not telling you anything that you don't already know, I'm not telling you anything that wasn't in the DMG reports of 2017, 2018, things that precipitated the creation of Act 173. Those different artifacts spoke to the overreliance and the overuse of paraeducator support in Vermont, and the need to strengthen the delivery of first instruction of universal instruction for all learners, and to ensure that our general education classrooms are designed to meet the needs of all those learners. So really our ask is that we finish what we started. It's in good legislation in 01/1973, we had some good ideas. We didn't bring them all to fulfillment. We need to finish what we started, we don't need policy churn, we need a coherent statewide plan that includes both implementation, support, and most importantly, accountability for our school districts, accountability for the field and accountability for the agency to ensure that we are seeing improved outcomes for all of our students. Professional staffing shortages have perpetuated the overreliance on support personnel, instructional assistants, paraeducators, we call them by different names, but they serve an integral function in terms of carrying out the system of supports and the continuum of services and supports for students with disabilities in Vermont schools. In order to create and maintain inclusive learning environments for all of our kids, as was recognized in 01/1973, it takes a lot of professional development adherence to a multi tiered system of supports to ensure that all learners get what they need. This requires highly high quality universal design for learning and an ongoing investment in teacher preparation and support of both teacher prep programs and in service support for in service practitioners. We need evidence based programs in literacy, math, and inclusive design. This isn't cheap. High quality classroom instruction and universal design for learning will over time reduce unnecessary services and expensive access supports. Act 173 spoke clearly to these needs. However, 173 lacked a system wide implementation plan and accountability systems for the school districts. There were good ideas, but we lacked implementation support, and most importantly, the accountability. We really need to finish the work that we started. If we want to decrease the reliance on educational support personnel, and what costs so much money there are our health insurance plans, right? $47,000 for a family plan. If we want to decrease the reliance on educational support personnel, we must increase the ability of all of our classrooms to meet the needs of all learners, including the students with disabilities. Special education is only as expensive as it needs to be to ensure that students with disabilities have access to general education programs and high quality instruction. I'm gonna turn things over to my colleague, Heather Freeman, to speak more specifically about some of our hopes around these priorities.

[Heather Freeman (President-Elect, VCSEA; Special Education Director, Orleans Southwest SU)]: Thank you. Thank you, Chris, and thank you everyone for having us back here today. We really appreciate it. I am Heather Freeman, president-elect of the Vermont Council of Special Ed Administrators. I am the special ed director in Orleans Southwest Supervisory Union in Hardwick. I have been there for twelve years. Before that, I was a preschool teacher and an early childhood special educator. So my testimony today brings that perspective and twenty two years in public education in Vermont. And I would like to end our close out our testimony today with a reminder, our hopes from BCSEA, and our legislative asks. So first, a reminder. Act 173, as my colleagues have said, was and remains very impactful legislation. We have to finish what we started. It laid the foundation for inclusive, layered instruction to support all students, every learner. It's also legislation at its core that is about high quality general education instruction. And that is essential to the success of our students. At the same time, Act 173 also changed the funding model for special ed so that the local education agencies didn't have to wait for students to become eligible. We could provide the right time supports when students needed to be more flexible and preventative. Next, I want to talk about our hopes. So VCSEA hopes that all of Vermont schools can realize the promise of Act 173. Again, we want to finish what we started. This looks like all students from pre K through grades 12 across our state accessing high quality general education instruction to gain those essential skills they need. This also looks like general education and special education silos being dissipated. And having the conversation focused on high quality instruction for all students. This also looks like funding models that support all students and don't create unnecessary divides between various stakeholders. And it looks like strong, content specific, knowledgeable leadership at the Agency of Education that works collaboratively with the superintendents, the principals, MTSS leaders across our state. I'm going to wrap up with our legislative acts in regards or asks in regards to Act 173. And the first one is that leaders and practitioners in our state need a clear implementation plan from the ALE so that each SU or SD can find an entry point into the work. There is significant variability across the state, depending on the SUSD's leadership, depending on the staffing, the resources, the prior work that that SUSD has done on multi tiered systems of support. And we feel that the implementation plan should include a multi year funding plan and map for consistent professional development. The field is craving that, they need it. We need coaching in multi tiered system of supports that is available for all roles in the system that support students. And that plan also needs to be guidance for the implementation of an MTSS framework with fidelity. So our second ask is around asking, requiring all supervisory unions and supervisory districts to produce Act 173 annual implementation reports that verify the fidelity of a robust MTSS system. Our third ask is to require legislative boundaries and decision making to ensure that new mandates don't outpace the field capacity to implement the good ones that have come through. And finally, our schools and our students need consistent, content knowledgeable leadership at the Agency of Education. There has to be that capacity, that expertise, and the effective stewardship at the state level for our students to reap the full benefits of Act 173 implementation across our state. With that, I'll invite Erin back up, and

[Rep. Emilie Kornheiser (Chair, House Ways and Means Committee)]: we will open it up to questions. Thank you for just incredibly comprehensive, clear, specific, well choreographed testimony, just a starter? Thank you. So

[Unidentified Representative (Joint Committee Member)]: one of the foundations of EC 173 is the Census Block Grant. And as you were describing, the increase in spending overall and the increase in special education spending of, I think, 37% versus 12%, I wonder if that's a result of the implementation of the Census Block Grant and isn't actually capturing all of the costs.

[Erin McGuire (Essex Westford School District; Past President, VCSEA)]: So the calculation I did to get that was the total special education expenditure, not related only to the census. So remember that the census grant comes in. And then we also spend out of the remainder of the design of educational funding beyond the census block grant. And so I do think that it is likely again, this would require like study and careful analysis, but the idea that the census block grant that began to kind of bring us down to a common block grant from where we were spending, anyone who was spending really high began to get less state money. And then the remainder of whatever you were spending came out of those local dollars, I do think had an impact in a way that was phased in and allowed districts to both maintain maintenance of effort and look for efficiencies to curb the growth. I do think that's true. I would say that's true in my own school district. And I certainly have heard from colleagues that that is the case. What allowed for, though, is smaller districts or smaller schools that had sudden influxes of high special education costs to have a way to manage that. I'm concerned about the foundation formula and the weighting design and sort of what that might do, because it will mean that if we do not fund special education with the weights enough to cover 100% of the cost, you're going to start cutting into the foundation formula. And that's going to put that competition that Chris was speaking to. But I do think that the glide path that you all created in Act 173 for the census model was helpful to curb cost.

[Unidentified Representative (Joint Committee Member)]: Do you think that the census block grant is the funding model that should move forward as we move into revamping how we plan this thing? It would certainly satisfy maintenance of that word, maintenance of the financial

[Erin McGuire (Essex Westford School District; Past President, VCSEA)]: Well, it would, if you put the census at 100% of the obligation, and if you also implemented the foundation formula. So, keep in mind that with implementation of a foundation formula for gen ed costs, you're going to need to create some design that covers 100% of the special education cost. And currently, the Act 173 census cost does not do that. It basically covers we'd have to look at the report, I think it's around a little over 50%. So the amount of total special education spend is like a lot more than the census block grant. But we knew that when we went in. But it didn't, you know, we didn't have the MOE problem because we had another way to generate enough funds without then cutting into general education to meet maintenance of effort while also on this glide path, recognizing where individual districts were.

[Rep. Emilie Kornheiser (Chair, House Ways and Means Committee)]: And so what to follow-up on those exact questions, think some of the thinking of moving to a waits for special education, I understand that the particular weight that is in the bill was far from ideal, and very much heard that and are studying a weight on your recommendations, that the census block grant was not sufficient because the general fund dollars would not be available in the future. But what I hear you saying is that you would likely like us to explore ways to reshape that Census Block Grant when paired with foundation formulas, rather than moving to a weight?

[Erin McGuire (Essex Westford School District; Past President, VCSEA)]: I think the CSEA remains open to the recommendations of, I believe there's a national expert being sought by the agency of education to take a look at the different funding models. What I would ask is that you all put a guardrail on that, that the design meets at least meets maintenance of effort. Keep in mind, if you maintain your funding, and we go up 7% to 12% in healthcare, and 3.5% in salaries, then maintenance of effort is not covering the increase for special educators either. I mean, that's just true for everyone. But if you were to put a guardrail on that we will not create a funding design that will put local districts at danger of risking their federal funds, we've been in a reimbursement model. We've been now in a census block model. And if you really want a weighted model, I mean, know, VCSEA is not like, no, don't do the weighted model. I mean, we're open to a dialogue with experts and policymakers to think about what makes the most sense under the circumstances. But whatever you do, please make sure that special education and general education are not in competition for dollars, because that's a bad idea. And then two, make sure that local districts do not get in a situation where they're not receiving enough funds to not meet maintenance of effort, and then potentially risk losing federal funds or cutting general education programming. That's our ask. But open to a conversation, especially if you're changing the entire funding model, I think we would be want to be thoughtful about what makes the most sense given the new funding design for special education. Don't want close to those conversations at all.

[Unidentified Representative (Joint Committee Member)]: In a sentence or two, if you like, and I think you've already said this much, but full implementation of Act 173, what's it gonna take?

[Erin McGuire (Essex Westford School District; Past President, VCSEA)]: You wanna start? Well, I mean, we There has to be a clear implementation plan, right? We have been given this law, and we have all done things very differently. There has to be guidance and clear direction from the agency of education around this. There has to be that, again, that strong content specific and knowledgeable leadership at the agency that can help steward the work collaboratively. And I think a recognition that all of the school districts and supervisory unions are gonna enter at a different point because we're all at different points right now. But there's gotta be that place. And the coaching, like there has to be coaching for the field around. Right? And that accountability piece of being reporting to the state. As a school district that I feel has implemented Act I, VII, and III, I agree with all of that. I would say very clear, common understanding of the design of a school in order to implement high quality first instruction that's accessible to everyone, the ability to understand tier one intervention that happens in that environment, the understanding that tier two is additional time and support to meet grade level expectations, and that tier three interventions are available to make sure that students who have gaps in their learning have services available to address those needs, and that we are very clear about students reading on grade level by third grade. So, just if you're looking for those points of measure, I think we can help generate those.

[Rep. Emilie Kornheiser (Chair, House Ways and Means Committee)]: I think the law actually does a

[Erin McGuire (Essex Westford School District; Past President, VCSEA)]: pretty good job of tagging those. And I think coaching and professional development for educators to be able to understand pedagogical practices, as well as content driven standards based learning to ensure that's happening has to be at the base. Does that help? Yeah, absolutely leadership. And again, just a reiteration of a funding model that really supports that flexibility to be preventative, a specialized funding model, whatever that looks like.

[Unidentified Representative (Joint Committee Member)]: A couple of us were talking after the AME presentation the other day, sort of about this, we do really great for keeping kids in the classroom, And we're sort of above the national average, 80 something percent of the time in the classroom. And then we're way above the national average in outplacement, high cost, special services. But in that middle area that seems to be utilized more in the rest of the country, sort of pull out services, that sort of thing, we are much lower than what you see, at least according to the stats they proposed. This isn't about methodology or no debt. It's about, is that a result of not having spaces in the schools that we have in order to have those pull out or not having scale, not having enough kids? Or is it much more about the philosophy in which we approach special ed in Vermont?

[Erin McGuire (Essex Westford School District; Past President, VCSEA)]: I would say first that Vermont, in 1975, decided that we were going to be highly inclusive when IDEA passed. We did not create separate settings. We used our public schools to bring individuals with disabilities to the access point of public education. And I think we've maintained that all the way through, and I think we should be proud of it. As a matter of fact, there's a study done by a private consultant agency that also focuses on staffing, so I'll predicate it that way. But Blazer Works found Vermont to be number one in special education delivery in the nation. And I think it's part of this effort to ensure that the promise of IDEA to educate students with non disabled peers to the greatest extent possible is what we live in Vermont schools. And we believe that. And as a matter of fact, from the Progress Center, there was a study done, and it was just released in 2025, that the number one factor for schools that are beating the odds related to achievement improvement for students on IEPs was a sense of belonging in their classroom. That is what made the biggest difference in that study related to the improvement of outcomes for students with disabilities. And so, I feel like it's critical that we don't look at that data point and be like, Oh, you know, we're not having enough kids out. But that for me, and I talked about this in the sprint team, please, please be very careful in however we craft this report, that we are not saying that we have too much inclusion. And I happen to know that there are some people that are talking about it like that. So, I think for me, it's very important that we don't speak about it that way. And we also have a high number of students in separate school settings. And I think making a higher number of in school opportunities for services available for students who have eventually been in place in separate school settings, for me is the reason to have that continuum conversation, not to reduce inclusion rates. So it really is about bringing kids home and figuring out how to meet the needs of more students with higher level needs inside of our schools with placements that are 40 to 79% in general education or under 40%. And I'm pretty sure our school buildings have space. You all might know better than me about that. But I'm pretty sure it's not a space challenge. Work is hard. And so staffing shortages are a very real tie to that particular issue. And then also, I think we could use some support in our state related to developing these kinds of programs. We haven't developed a lot of them. EWSD just built one for this year, we built a couple of therapeutic classrooms that are below 40% to serve a higher needs population. And our school has been very successful, but also extremely challenging to figure out how to do this work and how to make it really meaningful. I think we've hit that mark. But it is a new body of work that I think has been missing. We do agree with the agency on that piece that we need to think about some continuum in our public schools. Yeah, and it's also about being able to access that level of expertise you need to maybe come into the school versus, right, sending out. I think that's another big piece of it for us. And, you know, Erin and I work in two very different districts, right? Well, I mean, even in the supervisory union, so it's even much different, in my opinion. But we have a different level of resources available in Northeast Kingdom than Chittenden County has, So how do we balance that expertise need with the scale of what we have available to us?

[Chris Fenway (President, VCSEA; Director of Special Services, SVUVT/Slate Valley)]: Sorry, to add to the conversation that I think it was recognized that we had a lower number of students that were in residential placements. And so as you see that residential number decrease, sometimes you see the out of district number increase. And that would mean that you may have had students that have moved from a more restrictive residential program to a less restrictive program, which might be an out of district placement. So you can see a correlation sometimes as you look at those numbers. So I think that's some of the variety and some of the years that you see. I think they're also one of the senators or representatives mentioned small school size. Small school size can certainly impact if you have a very low number of students. Also the number of opportunities for students who need a higher level of care over the last several years has decreased dramatically in our state and around the country. So when that happens and there may be a student whose needs may necessitate a higher level of care, but that higher level of care is not available, then local school districts are left to figure it out locally and to implement a plan of support and services while a more appropriate placement is is being secured. And so that can also result in changes in numbers around out of district placements or the building of placements. I would echo what Erin has said and Heather about building capacity within our schools. We have done that within my district as well. We have four internal alternative programs that we operate, but we still have students whose needs exceed what can be met within that programming. And so there is a need to have options among the continuum, both within our schools and sometimes out of our public school settings in order to meet the needs of all learners.

[Rep. Emilie Kornheiser (Chair, House Ways and Means Committee)]: What'd I Sorry, Erin.

[Unidentified Representative (Joint Committee Member)]: No, if it's a follow-up, you should go first. I just want to

[Rep. Emilie Kornheiser (Chair, House Ways and Means Committee)]: make sure that I am understanding, even though I'm wary of overly distilling, and I want to make sure I'm tracking what you're saying, because it's outside of my own expertise and I have a lot of it. That some of the goal in sort of expanding practices related to in school, out of classroom time would be to bring students back to their homeschool from out of school placements. It would not be to bring more students out of the classroom.

[Erin McGuire (Essex Westford School District; Past President, VCSEA)]: Yes, that's my perspective. Yes, sure. Absolutely. Absolutely.

[Unidentified Representative (Joint Committee Member)]: Since we're talking so much about Act 173 implementation, we should be, I wanna follow-up on Representative Hunter's question a little bit. So take Essex Westbourne is an example of where implementation is quite strong or going well, can you break down even more how you get there? Who's providing the professional development? Are you developing it in house? How do you think it's impacting the workload for teachers and for administrators? Where is it maybe being picked up in costs, whether those are time costs or actual dollar costs?

[Erin McGuire (Essex Westford School District; Past President, VCSEA)]: So, I would say that the first connection I would make is part of a rule change that happened in special education that said that we would no longer use the discrepancy model to determine specific learning disabilities and cause schools to need to determine specific learning disability either through a design called patterns of strengths and weaknesses or response to intervention. And EWSD made a decision when that choice was on the table that we would be 100% using response to intervention and developing a multi tiered system of support that gave us the data in order to do that. And so we actually leveraged that rule change into systems change to support Act 173. Now that has passed, That that moment of opportunity. And not all I don't know how many districts did that in the state. But that was just this moment of opportunity. And what it did is it caused us to say, through professional learning communities, and through response to intervention, we will develop a clear system that will guide our school wide schedules to make sure there is time, space and support for students in the design and assignment of teachers based on expertise to be able to provide both high quality instruction and then those intervention tiers that I talked about. So, was a really important piece. The other thing that we did is we implemented an internal coaching design for teachers to support classroom teachers in having a colleague coach that would provide opportunity for them to learn skills that they might need to be able to participate in that environment. We did a lot of PLC training, how we use the four questions of the Dufour model to be able to think about student learning, what do we want students to know? What happens if they don't know? How will we know? Are series of things we ask ourselves. And so the professional development on that side was critical. And then lastly, I would say that accountability structures in the district office to ensure that all principals knew and understood what we were looking for, both through a walkthrough design as well as through a data view, could see into progress monitoring related to the interventions that were being implemented. So those are the critical pieces. We were able to do that while at the same time last year, we actually held stable, we did not increase a single dollar year over year, it was very difficult in the news a lot last year related to our budget. Because of that, we ended up repurposing a school building and closing a school, moving students to different grade levels. We also closed the Westford Middle School section of the school and moved those. So, was some consolidation work. But through those very difficult budget conversations, we also held very, very tight to our instructional framework, which includes essential standards and academics and SEL, includes a quality accountability system through assessment, it includes a tiered intervention system, and all within a framework of high quality social emotional learning and equity driven classrooms in schools. And those are the four components of instructional leadership in EWSD that guide our practice every day. All teachers understand it, all teachers know it, and they are working together to always improve. We use a lot of teacher collaboration. There's not a like, go in your room and teach approach. And so I do agree, though, with Heather about the scale that we're at, right? We're a merged district. We're a single school district, which creates a very different kind of governance structure inside of a school district to be able to do this work. We are also in Chittenden County. And I want to be very, very careful about situating Chittenden County next to rural school districts in Vermont, and acting like the work that is done in my school district should just be picked up in those environments. That is not fair. It should not happen, speaking as a rural Vermonter, right? That's not fair. And so we need to recognize the variability in Vermont on your question, I think, to make sure that we're not importing what I'm saying into a place where it might need to look different. Well, and I was going to say, I'm not going to share my story. However, I feel like it's very much parallel, but very different because it's Again, the scale, the area we're in, we are we are a just, supervisory union that has five member districts. We have eight school buildings. We have seven principals. It is very tricky to have this level of coordination that is mandated at the SU level and then have that consistent practice in all of our schools, right? And it really needs to start with strong leadership at the Agency of Education. And again, back to that implementation plan of what needs to be done. Variability just in one SU next to the other up in the Northeast Kingdom, we have an MTSS coordinator that is an admin. The next one has an MTSS coordinator that is a teacher, right? And then there's one that's a district level employee and one that's a school level employee. Like, what is that role? What does that look like? It looks very different for each school and each educational facility. And I also feel strongly that we have done a lot of great work in Orleans Southwest around this, and we need these opportunities, not only that guidance and implementation plan from the agency, but we also need time to talk to our colleagues. Because just listening to our colleagues and what the steps that they have gone through and what steps I have gone through, and then we can make those connections and adapt it for what we need. So we just need that time and that common professional learning. And we've done some of that together. I mean, we've, PWSC presented at the VSA, BCSA conference. Yeah, I mean, we're trying to find our way. But unfortunately, whatever, and again, I don't, I worry that there's a blame in this. I'm not sure what's happened at the agency, but it just hasn't been present enough to help the field with the things that it needs help with. And, you know, maybe that's about a balance between authority locally and statewide. It's hard to know. They would probably be best. And those who have been present before, maybe best to speak to the dynamics that are creating that. We there are colleagues that were in the agency a long time ago, they miss the agency of old that had tons of technical assistance, fully engaged in the field, collaboratively working together. It seems to me that they just have a staffing shortage. I'm not really sure. I saw that Chris wanted to jump in and

[Unidentified Representative (Joint Committee Member)]: say something.

[Chris Fenway (President, VCSEA; Director of Special Services, SVUVT/Slate Valley)]: Chris. No, thank you. I was just gonna piggyback on comments from Erin and Heather, because we do work in very diverse districts. So in Slate Valley, we would have been a huge benefactor under 01/1973, had we been able to get the support of our local constituents. But the year that that passed, it took us five tries to pass our local budget. And so while we've also closed schools, we've consolidated schools, we've reduced staff, We have also implemented largely with the use of federal funds, which is why MOE is so important to me, a multi tiered systems of support, but it is largely contingent upon the receipt of federal funds. Are a low spender in Vermont, one of the lowest vendors in Vermont. We're one of the lowest spenders in special education historically in Vermont in our district, but right now we have some of the highest outcome results in Rutland County for our students K through six. So I'm here to say it can be done with a lot of creativity, a lot of hard work, a lot of sweat, a lot of passion. And we here at VCSEA have that to bring to these ongoing conversations that we would like to have with this representative body and others, including the AOE. We wanna make good progress and we wanna see better outcomes for all of our kids. So we do wanna be part of that solution and really appreciate the time that you've given us today.

[Rep. Emilie Kornheiser (Chair, House Ways and Means Committee)]: Thank you so much. I think we have to wrap up here, so I'm gonna ask anyone who'll bring any questions to follow-up with the folks who are here in our time. But yeah, so grateful for all the attention you're able to or willing to give to us in this process in the midst of you doing all of the other great work that you're doing. Thank you.

[Erin McGuire (Essex Westford School District; Past President, VCSEA)]: Thank you so much for having us and taking the time. Deep appreciation.

[Chris Fenway (President, VCSEA; Director of Special Services, SVUVT/Slate Valley)]: Thank you.