Free ILTS Director of Special Education (234) Study Guide

Behaviorism

Behaviorism is a learning theory that focuses on observable, measurable behaviors rather than internal mental states. It holds that behavior is shaped through interactions with the environment, primarily through reinforcement and consequences. B.F. Skinner's work on operant conditioning demonstrated that behaviors followed by positive outcomes increase in frequency, while those followed by negative outcomes decrease.

• Positive Reinforcement: Adding a desirable stimulus after a behavior to increase its occurrence, such as providing verbal praise when a student completes a task independently.
• Negative Reinforcement: Removing an aversive stimulus after a behavior to increase its occurrence, such as allowing a student to skip a less-preferred activity after demonstrating on-task behavior.
• Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA): A systematic approach to understanding and changing behavior through data collection, functional assessment, and individualized intervention. ABA principles are widely used in programs for students with autism spectrum disorder and other significant behavioral needs.
• Task Analysis: Breaking complex skills into smaller, teachable steps so that students can master each component sequentially before performing the full skill.

Leadership Application: Directors oversee behavioral programming across a district. Understanding behaviorist principles allows you to evaluate the quality of behavior intervention plans, ensure staff are collecting meaningful data, and provide professional development on evidence-based behavioral strategies.

Constructivism

Constructivism holds that learners actively build knowledge by connecting new information to existing understanding. Rather than passively receiving facts, students construct meaning through experience, reflection, and social interaction. Jean Piaget's cognitive constructivism emphasizes how individuals assimilate and accommodate new concepts into their existing schemas, while Lev Vygotsky's social constructivism highlights the role of language, culture, and collaboration in learning.

• Schema: A mental framework that organizes and interprets information, revised continuously as learners encounter new experiences.
• Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD): The range of tasks a learner can perform with guidance from a more knowledgeable person but cannot yet accomplish independently.
• Scaffolding: Temporary instructional supports that help a student bridge the gap between current ability and the learning target, gradually removed as competence increases.

Leadership Application: Directors who understand constructivism can guide teachers in designing inquiry-based, student-centered lessons that accommodate diverse cognitive profiles. This is particularly relevant when overseeing inclusion classrooms where students with disabilities learn alongside their peers.

Social Learning Theory

Albert Bandura's social learning theory proposes that individuals learn not only from direct experience but also by observing the behaviors of others. Modeling, imitation, and vicarious reinforcement play central roles. Bandura's concept of self-efficacy — a person's belief in their own capability to succeed at a task — is a powerful predictor of motivation and performance.

• Modeling: Demonstrating a desired behavior so that observers can learn through imitation. In inclusive classrooms, peers without disabilities often serve as natural models for social and academic skills.
• Self-Efficacy: A learner's confidence in their ability to perform a specific task, which influences effort, persistence, and resilience in the face of challenges.

Leadership Application: Directors should promote the use of peer modeling, cooperative learning structures, and mentoring programs that leverage social learning. Building staff self-efficacy through coaching and professional learning communities is equally important for program success.

Multiple Intelligences

Howard Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences proposes that intelligence is not a single, fixed capacity but rather a set of distinct cognitive strengths. Gardner identified at least eight intelligences: linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalist. This framework encourages educators to value diverse talents and design instruction that reaches students through multiple pathways.

Leadership Application: Directors should ensure that instructional programs and assessment practices do not rely on a narrow definition of ability. Students with disabilities may demonstrate significant strengths in non-traditional domains, and IEP teams should consider the full range of a student's capabilities when planning goals and services.

Universal Design for Learning (UDL)

Universal Design for Learning is a proactive instructional framework that addresses learner variability from the outset rather than retrofitting accommodations after the fact. Developed by CAST (Center for Applied Special Technology), UDL is organized around three guiding principles:

• Multiple Means of Engagement: Providing varied options for motivation, self-regulation, and sustained effort — recognizing that learners differ in what captures their interest and keeps them invested.
• Multiple Means of Representation: Presenting content in diverse formats — text, audio, video, graphics, manipulatives — so that learners with different sensory, perceptual, and cognitive profiles can access the material.
• Multiple Means of Action and Expression: Allowing students to demonstrate their knowledge through various methods, such as written responses, oral presentations, multimedia projects, or physical demonstrations.

Leadership Application: A director of special education should champion UDL adoption district-wide because it reduces the need for individual accommodations by building flexibility into core instruction from the start. UDL aligns directly with the legal mandate to educate students with disabilities in the least restrictive environment.

Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS)

MTSS is a comprehensive framework that integrates academic and behavioral support across three tiers of increasing intensity. It combines the principles of Response to Intervention (RTI) for academics with Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) for behavior into a single, unified system. The model emphasizes data-driven decision-making, universal screening, and progress monitoring to determine which students need additional support and at what level.

• Tier 1 (Universal): High-quality core instruction and behavioral expectations provided to all students. Approximately 80% of students should succeed with Tier 1 supports alone.
• Tier 2 (Targeted): Supplemental, small-group interventions for students who demonstrate insufficient progress with core instruction, typically serving 10-15% of students.
• Tier 3 (Intensive): Individualized, intensive interventions for students who do not respond to Tier 2 supports, typically serving 3-5% of students and often involving special education evaluation.

Leadership Application: Directors play a critical role in aligning MTSS and special education processes. A well-implemented MTSS framework reduces inappropriate referrals, provides documentation that strengthens eligibility decisions, and ensures that struggling students receive timely support regardless of whether they have an identified disability.

Historical Evolution

Prior to the mid-twentieth century, students with disabilities were routinely excluded from public schools. Many were institutionalized or simply denied an education altogether. The shift toward inclusion followed several key phases:

• Era of Exclusion (pre-1950s): Students with significant disabilities were barred from public schooling. Institutions were the primary setting, often providing custodial care rather than education.
• Era of Segregation (1950s-1970s): Some students with disabilities gained access to schools but were placed in separate, self-contained classes with little or no interaction with the general education population.
• Normalization Principle: Introduced by Bengt Nirje and Wolf Wolfensberger, this principle argues that individuals with disabilities should have access to the same patterns and conditions of daily life as the general population. It became a philosophical cornerstone of the deinstitutionalization movement and the push for community-based services.
• Civil Rights Foundations: The landmark Brown v. Board of Education (1954) established that separate educational facilities are inherently unequal. Although decided in the context of racial segregation, this principle became the legal foundation for arguments that segregating students with disabilities also violates their rights to equal protection. Advocates built on Brown to argue that exclusion from general education constituted discrimination.
• Disability Rights Movement: Advocacy by individuals with disabilities and their families led to groundbreaking court decisions. Pennsylvania Association for Retarded Citizens (PARC) v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (1972) established that children with intellectual disabilities are entitled to a free public education. Mills v. Board of Education (1972) extended this right to all children with disabilities in Washington, D.C., establishing that a district's lack of funds is not an acceptable reason to deny educational services.
• Era of Inclusion (1990s-present): Federal legislation and evolving best practices have pushed for meaningful participation of students with disabilities in general education settings with appropriate supports and services.

Leadership Application: Directors must articulate this historical progression to staff, families, and school boards to build understanding of why inclusive practices are both a legal requirement and an ethical imperative. Knowledge of this history also helps directors recognize and challenge lingering attitudes that favor segregation.

Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA)

Originally enacted as the Education for All Handicapped Children Act (Public Law 94-142) in 1975 and reauthorized multiple times — most recently as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004 — this federal statute guarantees eligible students with disabilities the right to a free appropriate public education (FAPE) in the least restrictive environment (LRE). IDEA recognizes 13 disability categories and establishes six core principles:

• Zero Reject: No child with a disability may be denied a public education, regardless of the nature or severity of the disability.
• Nondiscriminatory Evaluation: Assessments must be administered in the student's native language, must not be culturally biased, and must use multiple measures to determine eligibility and inform programming.
• Free Appropriate Public Education (FAPE): Each eligible student is entitled to specially designed instruction and related services at no cost to the family, tailored to meet the student's unique needs as documented in an Individualized Education Program (IEP).
• Least Restrictive Environment (LRE): Students with disabilities must be educated alongside their nondisabled peers to the maximum extent appropriate, with supplementary aids and services provided as needed.
• Due Process: Parents and school districts have the right to resolve disagreements through mediation, resolution sessions, and impartial hearings. Both parties are protected by procedural safeguards that ensure transparency and fairness.
• Parent Participation: Parents are equal members of the IEP team and must be involved in decisions about their child's identification, evaluation, placement, and programming.

Key Reauthorizations: The 1990 reauthorization renamed the law IDEA and added autism and traumatic brain injury as categories. The 1997 reauthorization strengthened access to the general education curriculum and added requirements for participation in state and district assessments. The 2004 reauthorization aligned IDEA with the No Child Left Behind Act, introduced provisions for Response to Intervention as part of SLD identification, and expanded early intervening services.

Leadership Application: Directors must ensure that every staff member involved in special education understands and implements these principles. Noncompliance exposes the district to due process complaints, state monitoring findings, and potential loss of federal funding.

Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act

Section 504 is a civil rights statute that prohibits discrimination against individuals with disabilities in programs and activities receiving federal financial assistance. Unlike IDEA, Section 504 uses a broader definition of disability: any physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities. Students who do not qualify for IDEA services may still be entitled to accommodations under a Section 504 plan.

• Broader Eligibility: While IDEA covers 13 specific disability categories and requires a demonstrated need for specially designed instruction, Section 504 covers any student whose impairment substantially limits a major life activity such as learning, reading, concentrating, or breathing.
• Accommodation Focus: Rather than an IEP with measurable annual goals, Section 504 typically results in an accommodation plan that specifies modifications to the learning environment, instructional methods, or testing procedures.

Leadership Application: Directors must collaborate with general education administrators to ensure that 504 plans are developed, implemented, and reviewed for students who need accommodations but do not meet IDEA eligibility criteria. This requires clear procedures and trained staff across all buildings.

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)

The ADA, enacted in 1990, extends civil rights protections beyond federally funded programs to prohibit disability-based discrimination in employment, public services, transportation, and telecommunications. Title II applies to all public schools and requires accessible facilities, communications, and programs. The ADA Amendments Act of 2008 broadened the definition of disability to reverse narrow court interpretations that had excluded many individuals from protection.

Leadership Application: Directors must work with facilities managers and technology departments to ensure physical and digital accessibility. This includes accessible buildings, assistive technology, and accessible instructional materials for students and staff with disabilities.

Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA)

ESSA, signed into law in 2015, replaced the No Child Left Behind Act and reauthorized the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. While ESSA is primarily a general education law, it has significant implications for students with disabilities and for directors of special education.

• Accountability for Subgroups: ESSA requires states to include students with disabilities as a subgroup in their accountability systems. Schools must report achievement data, graduation rates, and growth measures for students with disabilities, ensuring that these students are not overlooked in school improvement efforts.
• Assessment Participation: Students with disabilities must participate in statewide assessments with appropriate accommodations. ESSA caps the percentage of students who may take alternate assessments at 1% of all tested students, pushing districts to provide access to grade-level content and assessments whenever possible.
• Evidence-Based Interventions: ESSA strengthens the requirement that schools use evidence-based practices and interventions, which directly affects how special education programs select curricula and instructional strategies.
• Supplement Not Supplant: Federal funds under ESSA must supplement, not replace, state and local funding. This principle applies to how special education resources are allocated alongside general education resources.

Leadership Application: Directors must ensure that their district's accountability plans include meaningful targets for students with disabilities, that assessment accommodations are properly documented and administered, and that special education programs use evidence-based practices that align with ESSA requirements. Directors also collaborate with general education leaders on school improvement plans that address the needs of students receiving special education services.

Ethical Standards

Beyond legal mandates, directors are guided by professional ethical codes from organizations such as the Council for Exceptional Children (CEC). Ethical practice in special education includes maintaining confidentiality of student records under FERPA, avoiding conflicts of interest in placement decisions, advocating for the needs of students even when it conflicts with administrative convenience, and ensuring that all evaluation and placement decisions are based on data rather than bias.

Leadership Application: Directors set the ethical tone for the department. They must model integrity, provide ethics training for staff, and create systems that safeguard student rights when institutional pressures favor cost-cutting or expedient solutions.

Key Developmental Theorists

• Jean Piaget (Cognitive Development): Piaget described four stages of cognitive development — sensorimotor (birth to age 2), preoperational (ages 2-7), concrete operational (ages 7-11), and formal operational (ages 11+) — proposing that children progress through these stages in a fixed sequence as they construct increasingly complex understandings of the world. For special education, Piaget's framework helps teams recognize when a student's cognitive functioning is significantly below age expectations and when instruction must be adapted to the student's current stage.
• Lev Vygotsky (Sociocultural Theory): Vygotsky emphasized that cognitive development occurs through social interaction and is mediated by language and cultural tools. His concept of the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) guides instructional decision-making for students with disabilities by identifying the level of challenge at which a student can succeed with support.
• Erik Erikson (Psychosocial Development): Erikson outlined eight stages of psychosocial development, each defined by a central conflict. For example, school-age children face the conflict of industry versus inferiority, where academic and social success builds confidence and repeated failure leads to feelings of inadequacy. Directors must ensure that programming supports students' psychosocial growth alongside academic progress.
• Urie Bronfenbrenner (Ecological Systems Theory): Bronfenbrenner proposed that a child's development is influenced by multiple nested systems — the microsystem (family, classroom), mesosystem (interactions between microsystems), exosystem (community resources, parental workplace), macrosystem (cultural values, laws, policies), and chronosystem (changes over time). This theory underscores the importance of collaboration across home, school, and community when serving students with disabilities.

Leadership Application: Directors use developmental theory to guide evaluation teams in interpreting assessment data, to ensure IEP goals are developmentally appropriate, and to help staff understand that disability does not follow a single pattern — each student's developmental trajectory is unique.

Principles of Individual Variation

Human development follows general patterns, but individual variation is the norm rather than the exception. Several key principles guide how directors and evaluation teams approach developmental differences:

• Development Is Sequential but Not Uniform: While children generally progress through developmental stages in a predictable order, the pace varies considerably. A student may demonstrate age-appropriate skills in one domain while showing significant delays in another.
• Nature and Nurture Interact: Genetic factors establish a range of potential, but environmental factors — quality of instruction, family support, nutrition, exposure to trauma — significantly influence how that potential is realized.
• Critical and Sensitive Periods: Certain developmental windows are particularly important for the acquisition of specific skills, such as language development in early childhood. Early identification and intervention during these periods can have a profound impact on long-term outcomes.
• Neurodevelopmental Considerations: Brain development is experience-dependent. Neuroplasticity — the brain's ability to reorganize neural pathways — is greatest in early childhood, which is why early intervention services under IDEA Part C (birth to age 3) and Part B, Section 619 (ages 3-5) are so critical.

Leadership Application: Directors must ensure that evaluation teams consider the full range of factors affecting a student's development before attributing delays to a disability. They also oversee child find activities, early childhood screening programs, and the transition of children from early intervention to school-age services.

Developmental Milestones and Their Role in Identification

Developmental milestones are age-referenced markers that describe the skills and behaviors typically observed in children at specific points in physical, cognitive, language, and social-emotional development. Significant delays in reaching milestones may signal the need for screening, evaluation, and early intervention services.

• Physical Development: Gross and fine motor milestones such as walking, grasping objects, writing, and coordinating complex movements.
• Cognitive Development: Problem-solving, memory, attention, and abstract reasoning benchmarks that progress with age.
• Language Development: Milestones in receptive and expressive language, from babbling to sentence construction to complex narrative skills.
• Social-Emotional Development: The ability to form attachments, regulate emotions, engage in cooperative play, and develop perspective-taking skills.

Leadership Application: Directors oversee child find activities and early childhood screening programs. Knowing the typical progression of milestones allows directors to train staff in recognizing early warning signs and making timely referrals for evaluation.

Disproportionality in Special Education

Disproportionality refers to the overrepresentation or underrepresentation of certain racial, ethnic, or linguistic groups in special education identification, specific disability categories, restrictive placements, or disciplinary actions. Federal regulations under IDEA require states to monitor districts for significant disproportionality and intervene when it occurs.

• Overrepresentation: When a particular racial or ethnic group is identified for special education services at rates significantly higher than their proportion of the total student population. For example, Black students have been historically overrepresented in categories such as intellectual disabilities and emotional disturbance.
• Root Causes: Disproportionality can result from implicit bias in referral and evaluation processes, culturally inappropriate assessment instruments, poverty and its impact on academic readiness, and insufficient pre-referral interventions.
• Comprehensive Coordinated Early Intervening Services (CCEIS): When a district is identified as having significant disproportionality, IDEA requires it to reserve 15% of its Part B funds for early intervening services to address the root causes.

Leadership Application: Directors must regularly analyze district data on identification rates, placement patterns, and discipline by race, ethnicity, and language status. When disparities emerge, directors lead corrective action, which may include revising referral procedures, providing cultural competence training, and strengthening general education interventions.

English Learners with Disabilities

Students who are English learners (ELs) and also have disabilities require careful evaluation to distinguish between language acquisition challenges and true disability-based learning difficulties. Misidentification in either direction — overidentifying ELs as having disabilities or failing to identify ELs who genuinely need special education — harms students and violates their rights.

• Evaluation in Native Language: IDEA requires that assessments be conducted in the student's primary language or mode of communication to ensure accurate results.
• Culturally Responsive Assessment: Evaluators must select instruments that are validated for diverse populations and interpret results in the context of the student's linguistic and cultural background.
• Language Acquisition vs. Disability: A student's difficulty with English may look like a learning disability in reading or oral expression. Evaluation teams must consider the student's progress in both their first language and English before concluding that a disability is present.

Leadership Application: Directors must establish evaluation protocols that include bilingual assessment when appropriate, collaboration with ESL specialists, and decision-making frameworks that consider second-language development timelines.

Twice-Exceptional Students

Twice-exceptional (2e) students demonstrate both a disability and giftedness or exceptional talent. Their abilities may mask their disability, their disability may mask their giftedness, or both may partially mask each other, making identification particularly challenging. These students require programming that simultaneously addresses their disability-related needs and develops their advanced abilities.

Leadership Application: Directors should ensure that evaluation teams are trained to recognize twice-exceptionality and that IEPs for 2e students include both accommodations for the disability and opportunities for enrichment and advanced learning.

Socioeconomic Factors and Educational Equity

Poverty has a well-documented impact on academic readiness, health, and access to resources. Students from low-income backgrounds are at higher risk for developmental delays and academic underachievement, which can lead to inappropriate referrals to special education when the root cause is environmental rather than disability-related. Additionally, families with limited resources may face barriers to participating in the IEP process, such as transportation, work schedules, or unfamiliarity with their rights.

Leadership Application: Directors must ensure that evaluation teams consider socioeconomic context when interpreting assessment data and that the district provides accessible meeting times, translation services, and parent education to support meaningful family engagement.

Continuum of Placements

IDEA requires districts to maintain a full continuum of alternative placements to meet individual student needs. This continuum ranges from the least restrictive to the most restrictive setting:

• General Education Classroom: Full-time placement with supplementary aids, services, and supports.
• General Education with Resource Services: Students receive specialized instruction in a resource setting for a portion of the day while spending the majority of time in general education.
• Self-Contained Classroom: Students receive the majority of their instruction in a separate classroom staffed by a special education teacher, typically joining general education peers for non-academic activities.
• Separate School: A specialized facility designed to serve students with more intensive needs that cannot be met in a neighborhood school.
• Residential Placement: A 24-hour setting for students whose needs require round-the-clock educational and therapeutic services.
• Homebound or Hospital: Instruction provided to students who are temporarily unable to attend school due to medical or other qualifying reasons.

Leadership Application: Directors must ensure that placement decisions are individualized and based on each student's needs, not on administrative convenience, disability category, or resource availability. The IEP team must document why a student cannot be satisfactorily educated in the general education setting with supplementary aids and services before considering more restrictive options.

Inclusion Models and Co-Teaching

Effective inclusion requires structured collaboration between general education and special education teachers. Co-teaching is one of the most widely used inclusion models, involving two licensed professionals jointly delivering instruction to a diverse group of students in a single classroom. The six commonly recognized co-teaching approaches are:

• One Teach, One Observe: One teacher leads instruction while the other systematically collects data on student engagement, behavior, or academic performance.
• One Teach, One Assist: One teacher provides primary instruction while the other circulates to provide individual support.
• Station Teaching: Content is divided into segments, and students rotate through stations led by each teacher, allowing smaller group instruction.
• Parallel Teaching: Both teachers simultaneously deliver the same lesson to half the class, reducing the student-to-teacher ratio.
• Alternative Teaching: One teacher works with a small group on a specific skill or concept while the other teaches the larger group.
• Team Teaching: Both teachers share equal responsibility for planning, delivering, and assessing instruction throughout the lesson.

Leadership Application: Directors must build systems that support co-teaching, including common planning time, professional development on collaborative instruction, and administrative structures that assign co-teaching pairs thoughtfully. Directors also evaluate whether co-taught classrooms are genuinely integrated or whether the special education teacher functions merely as an aide.

Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS)

PBIS is a multi-tiered framework for establishing a school-wide culture of proactive behavioral support. Rather than relying on punitive discipline, PBIS teaches expected behaviors, reinforces positive conduct, and uses data to identify students who need additional support. The three tiers are:

• Tier 1 (Universal): School-wide expectations, routines, and reinforcement systems that apply to all students. Approximately 80% of students respond to Tier 1 supports alone.
• Tier 2 (Targeted): Small-group interventions for students who do not respond adequately to Tier 1, such as social skills groups, check-in/check-out systems, or mentoring programs.
• Tier 3 (Intensive): Individualized interventions for students with persistent behavioral challenges, often involving a functional behavior assessment (FBA) and a behavior intervention plan (BIP).

Leadership Application: Directors should advocate for PBIS implementation across all schools because it reduces the need for exclusionary discipline practices that disproportionately affect students with disabilities and students of color. PBIS data also informs special education eligibility and programming decisions.

Supplementary Aids and Services

Supplementary aids and services are the supports provided in general education settings to enable students with disabilities to be educated alongside nondisabled peers. These can include modifications to curriculum, behavioral supports, collaborative staff planning, training for personnel, and the provision of paraprofessional assistance. IDEA requires IEP teams to consider what supplementary aids and services could enable a student to succeed in the general education classroom before recommending a more restrictive placement.

Leadership Application: Directors must ensure that a robust menu of supplementary aids and services is available across the district and that IEP teams document their consideration of these supports. Without adequate supplementary aids, students may be placed in more restrictive settings prematurely.

Trauma-Informed Practices

Research increasingly demonstrates the pervasive impact of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) on brain development, learning, behavior, and physical health. Trauma-informed schools recognize that many students with and without identified disabilities have experienced significant adversity, and they adjust policies and practices accordingly. Key principles include safety, trustworthiness, peer support, collaboration, empowerment, and cultural sensitivity.

Leadership Application: Directors should ensure that special education staff are trained to recognize trauma responses and distinguish them from disability-related behaviors. Trauma-informed approaches also influence how directors handle discipline, transition planning, and family engagement, particularly for students in foster care or those who have experienced neglect or abuse.

Evidence-Based Practices

The movement toward evidence-based practices (EBPs) requires that instructional strategies, interventions, and programs be supported by rigorous research demonstrating their effectiveness. IDEA and ESSA both emphasize the use of evidence-based approaches. For special education, this means that directors must evaluate whether the curricula, interventions, and behavioral strategies used across the district meet standards of evidence established by organizations such as the What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) or the National Technical Assistance Center on Transition.

• Strong Evidence: Supported by at least one well-designed experimental study.
• Moderate Evidence: Supported by at least one well-designed quasi-experimental study.
• Promising Evidence: Supported by at least one well-designed correlational study with statistical controls.

Leadership Application: Directors must establish systems for vetting new programs, providing professional development on EBPs, and monitoring the fidelity of implementation. When staff propose adopting a new intervention, the director should ask: "What is the evidence base for this approach, and does it match our student population?"

Mental Health Services in Schools

The growing recognition of mental health needs among children and adolescents has expanded the role of schools in providing social-emotional support. Students with emotional disturbance, anxiety, depression, and other mental health conditions may qualify for special education under IDEA or accommodations under Section 504. Schools increasingly employ school counselors, social workers, and psychologists who work alongside special education teams to provide comprehensive supports.

Leadership Application: Directors coordinate with mental health professionals to ensure that students' therapeutic needs are addressed within the educational setting. This includes incorporating mental health goals into IEPs when appropriate, facilitating partnerships with community mental health agencies, and training staff to create emotionally supportive classroom environments.

Technology in Special Education

Assistive technology (AT) and digital tools are transforming how students with disabilities access the curriculum, communicate, and demonstrate learning. Under IDEA, IEP teams must consider whether a student needs assistive technology devices or services to receive FAPE. Examples include:

• Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC): Devices and systems that supplement or replace spoken language for students with significant communication needs, ranging from low-tech picture boards to high-tech speech-generating devices.
• Text-to-Speech and Speech-to-Text: Software that reads digital text aloud for students with reading disabilities or converts spoken words to text for students with writing difficulties.
• Accessible Educational Materials (AEM): Digital textbooks, captioned videos, and other materials formatted to be usable by students with visual, auditory, physical, or cognitive disabilities.

Leadership Application: Directors must establish procedures for assessing AT needs, procuring and maintaining devices, training staff and students in their use, and evaluating whether AT is effectively supporting student achievement. As educational technology evolves rapidly, directors also serve as advocates for equitable access, ensuring that students with disabilities benefit from digital learning opportunities.

Response to Intervention and Specific Learning Disability Identification

The 2004 reauthorization of IDEA allowed states to use RTI data as part of the process for identifying students with specific learning disabilities (SLD), as an alternative to the traditional discrepancy model that compared IQ to achievement. Under the RTI approach, a student's failure to respond to increasingly intensive, evidence-based interventions may provide evidence of a learning disability. This shift has significant implications for how districts allocate resources at the intersection of general and special education.

Leadership Application: Directors must work closely with general education leaders to ensure that the tiered intervention system is implemented with fidelity so that RTI data can be used reliably in eligibility decisions. Without a well-functioning MTSS framework, RTI-based SLD identification is unreliable.