Lissa Power-deFur has had the pleasure of working as a speech-language pathologist in multiple settings throughout her career. From early intervention to rehabilitation and the Virginia Department of Education to higher education, she has enjoyed each professional opportunity. She earned her bachelors,’ masters’ and doctoral degrees from the University of Virginia earning certification in deaf education and audiology as well as speech-language pathology. She has been an active volunteer for the professions, spending decades serving in on the Speech-Language-Hearing Association of Virginia’s Board, the ASHA Board of Directors, and various SHAV and ASHA committees and boards. She is a Professor Emeritus at Longwood University where she served as the founding program director, department chair, and interim dean. She continues to serve through presentations and publications on such topics as ethics, speech sound disorders, special education assessment and legal issues. She serves as an accreditation site visit chair for graduate programs in speech-language pathology, as a Trustee of the Communication Disorders Foundation of Virginia, and as a volunteer in an art program for persons with dementia and as a early literacy tutor.

Financial: Lissa Power-deFur is receiving compensation from Bilinguistics in exchange for this presentation.

Non-Financial: None.

Although special education has been required nationwide for 50 years, there remain challenges in accurate evaluation of children and determination of a child’s eligibility for special education services. The session will begin with a brief historical perspective, including changes in requirements in the areas of evaluation and assessment over time. The relationship between federal, state, and local special education requirements will be explored, as these result in variability in implementation from state to state and school division to school division.

The current IDEA requirements regarding evaluation and assessment will be discussed in detail, highlighting the expectations regarding standardized and non-standardized (contextualized) assessment. The accuracy of speech-language measure in identifying whether a child has a speech-language impairment will be discussed, illustrating with case studies. Recent advances in evaluation will be explored, with discussion of how these enable SLPs to meet the expectations of IDEA.

After discussion of a comprehensive assessment, the session will then examine the 3-prong test for eligibility: does the child have a disability, does the disability have an adverse educational impact, does the child need special education and related services? IDEA’s expectations regarding how these requirements will be met will be reviewed, with scenarios.

As the eligibility determination is made by a team, the relationship between the speech-language pathologist and the eligibility team in the determination of eligibility will be explored, with scenarios. Eligibility determination is again required when a child’s special education services are concluded. The preparation for dismissal and eligibility decision-making regarding dismissal will be discussed, with vignettes.

Participants will be able to:
• Explain IDEA’s requirements regarding evaluation and appropriate evaluation measures
• Identify assessments and assessment strategies that lead to more informed special education eligibility decisions
• Discuss the 3-prong test for determining eligibility for special education
• List 3 strategies to use when planning for dismissal

Time-Ordered Agenda
05 minutes Introductions, disclosures
10 minutes Special education requirements: IDEA, states and localities
10 minutes Evaluation and assessment: IDEA requirements
10 minutes Applying assessment best practices to special education evaluations
10 minutes Disproportionality: the data and our responsibilities
15 minutes The eligibility determination process
05 minutes Determination of adverse educational impact
10 minutes Dismissal process
15 minutes Questions and answers

Course Completion Requirements:
Practitioners attending live events will be asked to answer questions at the end of the course about what they learned and how they will use the information they learned in practice. Once the questions are completed, participants will receive their certificate.

Practitioners attending recorded sessions demonstrate learning and attendance by passing a quiz with a score of 80% or greater. The quiz addresses questions from material presented throughout the course. Practitioners can retake the quiz if they do not initially obtain a score of at least 80%. For events including case studies, participants download, read, and utilize materials in order to participate.