Problem-Solving and RESPONSE TO INTERVENTION: Implications for Policy & Practice

Presenter: Dr. David Prasse
Loyola University Chicago
dprasse@luc.edu

What are the Benefits of Problem-Solving?

The advent of NCLB and IDEIA 2004 has forced much needed change in education’s most ineffective and indefensible system, the separate entities of General Education and Special Education. The focus has moved from compliance and categorization of students to data-driven intervention and progress monitoring. Administrators must join hands in a system of unified education and develop interventions that demonstrate improved student performance, regardless of label, ethnicity, economic level, or cognitive ability.

In the mid nineties, Senator Kennedy, who had been one of the best supporters of Education and Special Education, met with a group of educators and asked, “How are students with disabilities doing?” Dr. Prasse was one of this group who had to respond essentially, “We don’t know.” Senator Kennedy and his staff were incredulous. How could we have spent billions of dollars for over 25 years on a program that we aren’t certain is helping? What we have since learned through careful analysis is that the dual system of general and special education has been both ineffective and inefficient. We have actually shrunk general education teachers’ understanding of what they can do. We have taught them to comply and to categorize, and convinced them that they don’t have the skills to teach a large number of students. Accurate placement in special education programs does not guarantee that students are exposed to interventions that maximize their rate of progress. Effective interventions result from good problem-solving, not good testing. Progress monitoring is done best with authentic, curriculum-based, assessment that is sensitive to small changes in student academic and social behavior.

With a focus on results, not on the process itself, our question should become “What type of interventions does this child need?” rather than “Is or isn’t this child LD?” Dr. Prasse contends that we have not been required to give traditional tests for purposes of LD identification since 1997. This has been more clearly stated with the IDEIA 2004 Regulations:

The LEA shall not be required to take into consideration whether the child has a severe discrepancy between achievement and intel lectual ability in oral expression, listening comprehension, written expression, basic reading skill, reading comprehension, mathematical calculation, or mathematical reasoning.

In determining whether a child has a specific learning disability, a local educational agency may use a process that determines if a child responds to scientific, research-based intervention. (Summary of IDEIA 2004 section 300.307).

Problem Solving IS NOT a way to avoid special education placements or a less expensive way of schooling. The focus is placed on HOW a student is doing, not WHERE the student is going (e.g. down the hall to the Special Education or Title I room). Interventions are integrated, not done by team members or special educators only. The problem-solving process:

Response to Intervention is a systematic and data-based method for determining the degree to which a student has responded to implemented interventions. This information can be utilized in making decisions about eligibility for special education. However, the three-tiered model described by Dr. Prasse is not about General versus Special Education, or solely about how to determine eligibility. Rather, it is about teams of educators making evidenced-based decisions about how to provide students with what they need to progress.

Using RTI to determine eligibil­ity for Special Education:

TIER 1: School-Wide Screening and Intervention
TIER 2: Assessing Response to Instruction during Team-based Problem Solving
TIER 3: Appraising the Extent of Academic Deficiency and Evaluat­ing the Need for Specially Deigned Instruction.

When RTI is used to determine eligibility for Special Education, the following conditions are considered:

Have previous interventions (Tiers 1 and 2) sufficiently improved a student’s rate of learning? If not, what additional resources are needed to enhance student learning?

Based on progress data, are the interventions required for this student to learn at a sufficient rate, too demanding to be implementedwithout special education resources?

Information Exchange/ Professional Swap Shop!

NAPSA conference attendees have consistently indicated that a tremendous benefit of membership and conference attendance is the opportunity to share information with colleagues from across the nation. In response, a conference “Focus Session” was dedicated to facilitated round table discussion on topics of national relevance:

Safe Schools: Gwen Willis,
Guilford County Schools, NC
Continuous Improvement:
Dr. John Correll, IL
Salt Creek S.D. 48, IL
Accessing Student Services K to Post Secondary:
Dr. Charles Bell, College of
Education, Barry University, FL
Special Education Instructors and the General Curriculum:
Ellen Correll,
Community Consolidated S.D. #46, IL