How can school administrators support implementation of high-quality IEPs?
Page 5: Implementing the IEP
Procedural Requirements Guidelines
Implement the special education services as written in the IEP- Ensure that parents are meaningfully involved in the IEP process
- Adhere to required timelines
The purpose of the implementation stage of the IEP process is to deliver the services and supports outlined in a student’s IEP. To ensure that these services and supports are implemented correctly, the school administrator should make sure that:
- Parents are meaningfully involved in the IEP’s implementation
- School personnel understand their responsibilities and have the skills and training necessary to deliver the supports and services as outlined in the IEP (i.e., with fidelity)
fidelity
The degree to which an intervention is implemented accurately, following the guidelines of its developers.
Legislation and Litigation 
School leaders who do not adhere to these procedural guidelines can face serious consequences.
- In Kay Williams v. Cabell County Board of Education (1996), a school principal was removed in part due to failures to exercise leadership responsibilities, ensure that teachers implemented the IEP, and cooperate with parents.
- In Van Duyn v. Baker School District 5J (2007), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit found that a school district had denied FAPE when it provided only slightly more than half the number of hours of math instruction per week called for in a student’s IEP. According to the court, even if an IEP meets the procedural and substantive requirements of the IDEA, a school may still violate a student’s right to FAPE if a material or important part of the IEP was not implemented.
Engage Parents
The Supreme Court’s decisions in Rowley (1982) and Endrew F. (2017) emphasized the importance of the collaboration between school personnel and a student’s parents throughout the IEP process. These case decisions provide evidence that meaningfully involving parents in the IEP process is vigorously protected by the courts. For parents to be meaningfully involved in the implementation of the IEP, the school administrator needs to ensure that systems and processes are in place to:
- Establish and maintain open lines of communication—Because parents are valuable resources, any information they share should be considered. For example, when a student is having difficulty at school, the parent can often offer insight and can be instrumental in identifying possible reasons and solutions.
- Frequently inform the parents of their child’s progress toward meeting her IEP goals and objectives.
- Involve parents in any changes to their child’s IEP.
Tip
About a week after the meeting and once implementation begins, it is a good idea to check with the parents to see if they have any questions.
Breanne Venios describes how her school facilitates parent communication (time: 1:24).
Transcript: Breanne Venios
Our school facilitates parents’ communicating any changes in student progress or behavior by keeping the lines of communication open. We have teams here at our school so the parent knows exactly what teachers their child has. We encourage them to email if they have a concern. Some of our students actually have written in their IEP that the learning-support teacher will send daily updates. The regular ed teachers keep a running document of what had happened during that day, usually for behaviors, and then the parent is kept in the loop because they get a daily email, which I’m usually CCed on just so that we can all see what’s going on and see what next steps we have to do. Our teams are highly encouraged to do team meetings throughout the year, not just when there is a concern. We try to be more proactive rather than reactive. We also do what we call circle of support meetings that some of our parents prefer to have quarterly meetings instead of just the yearly IEP meetings. Once per marking period, they would be able to just come in for a team meeting and get updates that way or talk about any concerns that they have. So we really try to keep our lines of communication open. Our teachers are also reaching out to the parents, because sometimes parents don’t know how to reach out to our teachers.
Support School Personnel
For Your Information
Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) is a federal law, the purpose of which is to protect the privacy of a student’s personally identifiable information (PII), such as educational records. To comply with FERPA, schools require a parent’s or guardian’s signature to release a student’s educational record.
IDEA requires that school personnel begin to deliver the services outlined in the IEP as soon as possible. To guarantee there is no delay, the school administrator should make sure all individuals involved in implementation:
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Have access to the IEP: Although they are confidential documents, IEPs should be shared (either in hard copy or electronically) with anyone responsible for the provision of services. This includes the special and general education teachers, related service providers, paraprofessionals, and other relevant school staff (e.g., administrative staff, bus drivers, substitute teachers). Although sometimes misconstrued as such, sharing a student’s IEP with relevant parties is not a violation of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). However, because of confusion and misperceptions surrounding what is permissible and what is not, it’s important that the school administrator remind those with access to the IEP that it is a confidential document and periodically meet with them to review their responsibilities regarding confidentiality.
Although school administrators might be tempted to provide a mere summary or overview of the IEP, it’s important that everyone involved in the implementation of services and supports have the opportunity to read the document in its entirety. Similarly, merely providing access to the complete text of the IEP is not sufficient either. It is crucial to make sure that service providers fully understand the information contained in the IEP and the connections among its many components (e.g., PLAAFPs, goals, services).
- Know their responsibilities for IEP implementation: To make certain that the IEP is implemented as intended—and thus to maximize the likelihood that the student will meet the outlined goals—every individual who provides services to the student must understand her or his responsibilities. These might involve providing specialized instruction for a specified portion of the day, providing accommodations, collecting and reporting progress monitoring data, or communicating a student’s progress to her parents, among other tasks. If for whatever reason a member or members of the IEP team were unable to attend the IEP meeting, school administrators might want to consider establishing a process by which those parties can indicate that they have read the IEP and understand their individual responsibilities.
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Are informed of the accommodations, modifications, and supports that must be provided to the student: Because students sometimes require different accommodations, modifications, and supports throughout the day, each service provider should be aware of those he is responsible for implementing. One way to do this is to use a form to record a student’s IEP goals and the services and supports needed for the student to achieve those goals in different content areas. This form should be completed for each individual who will be implementing these supports. Following the meeting, it can be shared with relevant school personnel to help them understand their responsibilities to ensure the IEP is implemented as intended. Following is a form that school leaders can use to accomplish this.
Further, the school administrator is responsible for providing needed support for educators so that they can effectively deliver the services and supports outlined in the IEP. She can do so by 1) monitoring educators’ professional development (PD) needs and providing training, and 2) creating structures and opportunities for collaboration.
Did You Know?
Providing instruction for students with disabilities necessitates special knowledge and expertise. Unfortunately, a large percentage of general education teachers, in particular those new to the profession, do not feel adequately prepared to teach these students.
Effective leaders ensure that school personnel have the knowledge and skills they need to effectively carry out their roles and responsibilities associated with the IEP process and the implementation of the services and supports documented in the IEP. One way to accomplish this is to provide effective professional development (PD). To determine PD needs, the administrator can conduct needs assessments and routine observations. The table below lists a few areas in which educators might need training, although factors such as prior knowledge, expertise, and level of experience will influence the type of PD they require.
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Research Shows
A meta-analysis of 35 studies across three decades indicates that effective PD—that which results in changes in teacher practices and improved student learning outcomes—consists of seven commonly shared features:
- Is content focused
- Incorporates active learning utilizing adult learning theory
- Supports collaboration, typically in job-embedded contexts
- Uses models and modeling of effective practice
- Provides coaching and expert support
- Offers opportunities for feedback and reflection
- Is of sustained duration
(Darling-Hammond, Hyler, Gardner, & Espinoza, 2017)
Effective PD consists of high-quality training and ongoing support that, ideally, involves a knowledgeable individual who observes implementation and offers corrective feedback. The goal of ongoing support is to improve and maintain the skills necessary for correct implementation, to maintain motivation and commitment, to address potential problems, and to prevent drift. Ongoing support should be provided frequently throughout the year, both on a scheduled and as-needed basis. Educators who receive high-quality training and on-going support implement with greater fidelity than those who do not. Moreover, those who receive extensive training typically implement with greater fidelity than those who receive only limited training.
drift
In implementation fidelity, the inadvertent modification or omission over time of the recommended procedures or activities that make up a practice or program; usually occurs gradually and is considered a threat to fidelity.
For Your Information
In the event that training is not available or is not feasible, educators can learn the implementation procedures on their own. They can do so by carefully reading and following step-by-step procedures outlined in an existing manual or set of guidelines. A manual helps ensure a degree of program quality by increasing the day-to-day consistency of implementation for an individual as well as from person to person. The more specific the manual, the greater the potential that educators will implement a practice or program with fidelity.
Tamara McLean, a special educator, describes a couple of ways training is provided at her school to general educators regarding accommodations (time: 0:54).
Tamara McLean
Exceptional Education Teacher
Nashville, TN/p>
Transcript: Tamara McLean
A lot of times when I add an accommodation, I actually do that accommodation myself in the classroom for probably the first month, so they really see how it plays out. This is what it looks like. Here’s how we can do it. Same things for accommodating centers. And then they can do it. In my school, we have created a movement and fidget library. And myself and another special education teacher created training videos that the teachers have to view before they’re able to check anything out. Because just taking these things into the classroom and handing them over creates actually more problems than they solve. So everything with accommodations is taught explicitly to teachers. And so how it plays out in the classroom definitely comes from us teaching the gen ed. teachers.
For more information on providing effective PD, see the following IRIS Modules:
Collaboration: An arrangement in which two or more individuals work together toward a common goal of planning, implementing, or evaluating a specific aspect of an educational program for a student or group of students.
Typically, multiple educators are responsible for providing services and supports to students with disabilities. School administrators can encourage collaboration by allocating time for these educators to collaborate on a regular basis. Recall that the majority of students who qualify for special education services spend at least some portion of the day in general education classrooms. They might also receive services from a special education teacher, one or more related service providers, and a paraprofessional. For this reason, it is essential that these educators have opportunities to collaborate about how best to support these students. Whether in pairs, small groups, or large groups, educators might collaborate in regard to:
- Adapting the general education curriculum to meet the student’s needs
- Aligning general education and special education instruction
- Identifying instructional practices and strategies that might benefit the student
- Developing appropriate assessments
Research Shows
When school leaders (in this case, principals) supported teachers’ collaborative efforts, these efforts were associated with increased student achievement.
(Goddard, Goddard, Kim, & Miller, 2015)
Providing effective PD and opportunities for educators to collaborate is a great starting point for helping to ensure that a student’s IEP is implemented correctly. However, these activities do not guarantee that educators will implement the services and supports outlined in the IEP as intended. Further, these activities alone do not guarantee appropriate student progress. For this reason, it is critical that the school administrator have processes in place to monitor both implementation fidelity and student progress. The following page provides more information on how to accomplish these tasks. But first, Breanne Venios discusses access to IEPs at her school, the structures that have been put in place to provide PD, and ways to foster collaboration.
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Breanne Venios
Principal, Spring Cove Middle School
Roaring Spring, PA
Transcript: Breanne Venios
Access to IEPs
Access for IEPs at our school vary. Any learning-support teacher has access to the program that we use to generate the IEPs, so they have a login and password for that. The administrators have a login and password for that as well, so I can go in at any time and pull up any student’s IEP. Our regular ed teachers read all of the IEPs and then they sign off that they’ve read and understood them. Our learning-support teachers make what we call a cheatsheet, so any of the specially designed instruction that they might need or the accommodations they make the child’s name and then the things that the teacher has to implement. So if it’s eliminating an answer choice or small-group testing, so that’s a cheatsheet that the teachers are given so that they can make sure that they’re implementing all of that. If we have a substitute teacher in, the teachers leave a note for them, if needed. For instance, if there is a child who needs frequent breaks and that is written in their IEP, obviously we need to let the substitute know that. If there is a child who has a crisis plan, we need to let the substitute know that so that they can obviously respond appropriately. We do give information, as needed, for our guests in the building, but other than that if a teacher needs to know anything further about the IEP they are able to come down. They are in a locked student file, but they can view the IEP when they need it, but they don’t have the actual copy in their room.
Another way that we ensure all relevant staff know their responsibilities for IEP implementation is, at the beginning of the year, we do transitional meetings with our learning-support teacher and the regular ed teachers, because they do work very closely as a team. The 6th-grade teacher will talk about the students with the 7th-grade learning-support teacher and then that learning-support teacher will meet with a team of 7th-grade teachers so that way they can have a heads-up of any needs. If they have a student who has a specific behavioral plan or a crisis plan, they would know that from the beginning of the year. The 6th-grade teacher can give feedback to the 7th-grade teachers, and the 7th-grade teacher can give feedback to the 8th-grade teachers, because they know that student the best so they can better prepare the teachers. So we do transitional meetings in addition to the other things that we’ve done.
Transcript: Breanne Venios
Professional Development
We monitor PD multiple ways. We do have district-required professional development. Usually at the beginning of the year, we have a guest come and address the whole staff on anything from responding to crisis situations, trauma, or de-escalation techniques. We do that as a district, but one thing that I try to do as a building leader is just be in the know with my teachers. I attend all of the team meetings. I try to be in the classrooms as much as possible. I hear what they ask, I hear what they need, and I talk to my learning-support teachers a lot. So if they have concerns, they don’t necessarily feel it’s appropriate for them sometimes to address teachers, so they’ll let me know and I can do that. And then if I hear the same concern over and over again, I know that that needs to be addressed as a staff, but I have conversations with the teams. I use data collection. I always say it has to be observable data. So if I see a concern through that, I can address it. We have at-risk meetings. If one of our students is not making progress, we bring that up at the at-risk meeting that we have every quarter, and we ask why that student’s not making progress. And if I see a consistency there that might be something that the teachers aren’t doing or implementing then I can address that and give them the professional development that they need.
But it always goes back to the student’s progress. If they’re not making progress, we have to find out why. So I use that and then I’ll make our in-services. I did a whole year teaching the teachers about differentiated instruction whenever we went from homogeneous grouping to heterogeneously grouping. So I knew that that was something that they would need, so I made that our focus. So I try to take data, and I try to see what needs they need and make it relevant for them. If I have one or two teachers that may be struggling with implementing one of the accommodations or they’re not understanding why something has to happen, I always sit down with them one-on-one and discuss that. It always starts with a discussion, and I explain the whys. If we are doing something and we don’t know why then we need to make sure we know why. So maybe I pull up the IEP and I show them specifically what are the goals? What are we looking at? If they don’t take our conversation and change from that then my job is to hold them accountable. It’s not that we want to give them more work. It’s not that we just want to implement something for no reason. It’s what’s best for the child.
Transcript: Breanne Venios
Collaborating
We have some structures in place to provide opportunities for educator collaboration such as team and content-area meetings. One day every other week, they meet as a 6th-grade team, a 7th-grade team, and then an 8th-grade team. And then on the opposite weeks, they meet with their content-area teachers. So math meets together, English together, and so on. During those meetings, there is a conversation of any student concerns and what we’re doing to assist with student concerns, whether that be discussing some classroom management techniques or how are they doing in your class, what are you doing if they’re struggling with this. So we have those conversations, and also, when possible, I like to give planning periods together with the co-teachers. So if our learning-support teacher is co-teaching with the English teacher, I try to give them a common plan. It doesn’t always, unfortunately, work out that way, but that way it’s more meaningful for them, because they can plan together. At the end of the day, we have what we call activity periods, so they use that time together to meet. So we have pockets within the day that they can get together and collaborate, but we definitely have set time for our team meetings and our content-area meetings.
For Your Information
There are several serious procedural errors that IEP teams should avoid when implementing the IEP. These include:
- Failing to monitor a student’s progress
- Failing to implement the student’s services and supports with fidelity
- Failing to involve the student’s parents
The last several pages of this module have included information about common errors related to the content on those pages. The handout below offers a combined list of these errors along with more detailed information about each.
