Special Education Assessment

Michigan Department of Education Office of Special Education June 16, 2020

The Michigan Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) State Plan recommends that education based multidisciplinary evaluation teams have access to information and training in ASD eligibility determination to improve the consistency of practices. The purpose of this document is to provide guidance to schools to develop evaluation processes to ensure accurate eligibility decisions, improve cross-agency collaboration to reduce duplication, ensure a seamless process for families, and provide relevant information to inform the Individualized Education Program (IEP). In some instances, this document addresses considerations of evaluation components that exceed requirements of federal law or Michigan Administrative Rules for Special Education (

Two parental questionnaires were used in this research to obtain information about the children’s language development and language environment, in both their first and second language. Below are brief descriptions of the purpose and content of each questionnaire, with links to downloadable versions of the questionnaires. Note that these questionnaires are intended to be given as interviews to ensure parents understand the questions.

This guidance document reflects of efforts of many professionals within the Washtenaw Intermediate School District and the local school districts of Washtenaw County. Guidance documents from Charlevoix-Emmet Intermediate School District, Wayne RESA, and Lapeer County Intermediate School District were reviewed in order to assist in the development of this document.

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Introduction The COVID-19 pandemic has created significant challenges for schools in meeting the needs of all children and students in early childhood, elementary, secondary, and postsecondary education. These challenges will continue as schools and public agencies1 seek to ensure support and equity for children and students experiencing the long-term adverse health effects of COVID-19, commonly referred to as long COVID. This resource is issued jointly by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) and the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS) to provide information about long COVID as a disability and about schools’2 and public agencies’ responsibilities for the provision of services and reasonable modifications to children and students for whom long COVID is a disability. The discussion here focuses on two Federal laws: Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (Section 504) and Parts B and C of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).3

The only time it is appropriate to shorten the school day for a student with a disability is when the student’s IEP team determines a shortened day is required to address the student’s unique disability-related needs. It is the position of the MDE that affording a student less than a full school day in order to eliminate the occurrence of a student’s problematic behavior in the educational environment (rather than teaching new skills) is contrary to the IDEA’s goal that an IEP result in appropriate progress, and directly at 3 odds with the well-established zero-reject principle. Before deciding to shorten the student’s day, the IEP team must consider other ways to meet the student’s needs.

There are currently over 130 languages used in Oakland County, and the percentage of Oakland County students who identify themselves as English Learners has increased steadily over the last five years. English Learners (ELs) are both under-identified and over-identified as having disabilities in schools. General education, Title I, ESL, and special education professionals must work together to safeguard the educational opportunities of students who are learning English as a second language as well as nondiscriminatory evaluation practices of school teams. With these responsibilities in mind, this document is intended to assist educators in developing an understanding of the big ideas that teams should consider prior to completing a special education evaluation for students learning English as a second language. The aim of this guidance is to support districts in developing their own process for determining whether the learning difficulties of an English Learner are the result of the influence of primary language-learning differences or a true, pervasive, disability present in all languages of the child that interferes with the child‟s ability to access or progress in the general curriculum and requires specially designed instruction. A secondary purpose is to assist districts in making a long-term plan for reshaping identification practices using non-discriminatory evaluations. This guidance document does not offer a comprehensive, step-bystep process for a special education evaluation of students learning English as a second language. Rather, the big ideas contained herein may be embedded into any local school or district‟s own processes and procedures as appropriate.