Headline News:

• AB SpEd PAC Special Education Parent Handbook – The AB SpEd PAC is proud to release its new Special Education Parent/Guardian Handbook to help guide families through the often confusing world of special education. This handbook shares special education procedures, offers parent tips and resources and includes a listing of the special education programs and services available in the Acton Public and Acton-Boxborough School districts. We hope you'll find it a useful reference tool.

• Donate to support ABSpEdPAC programs and services. Please make checks payable to "Friends of ABSpEdPAC" and mail to Caroline Jarvis, Treasurer, 95 Hammond Street, Acton, MA 01720. To learn how your donation will help reference our recent letter.

• The DESE has issued an informative new guidance document for PACs titled "Guidance for Special Education PACs." This document contains a lot of good background information that clarifies the PAC's relationship to the school district.

• AB SpEd PAC's June 3rd, 2010 presentation to the School Committee is titled "Spring Presentation to School Committee 2009-2010 School Year." Also included are Addendum A "Autism Focus Group Parent Priorities" and Addendum B "Guidance for Special Education PACs".

• Feedback from Autism Parent Focus Groups - Multiple Autism Parent Focus Groups were conducted as a result of parent feedback from the 2008 AB SpEd PAC Parent/Guardian Survey, which indicated parents of Autism Spectrum students were significantly less satisfied with the special education programs and services provided by the district than parents of children with Specific Learning Disabilities. The Parent Focus Groups were a positive learning experience for parents and staff and a constructive collaboration between Pupil Services and the AB SpEd PAC. We have prepared a summary of the top parent priorities (by category) that were shared during the multiple Autism Parent Focus Groups that Pupil Services conducted during January and February of 2010. A total of four Autism Parent Focus Groups were held - 1) for parents of children in Preschool to Grade 3, 2) for parents of children in Grades 4-6, 3) parents of children in Grades 7-12, and 4) parents of Out-of-District (OOD) students. Interestingly parent priorities were remarkably consistent across all grades. You can read this report here: Autism Focus Group Parent Priorities.

• 2009 MCAS Performance Summary and Analysis - As a result of Conant and R.J. Grey being designated as schools that need improvement under NCLB for special education students, we've put together some basic information about MCAS and No Child Left Behind to help parents better understand the current designation. We've created a new webpage with lots of interesting MCAS information. As many of you know the Department of Education has recently introduced a new tool called a growth model to help measure annual student/school/district growth via MCAS. This tool will provide more information regarding individual student growth each year as compared to a similar academic peer group across the state. In addition, growth model data will provide more direct information about the effectiveness of individual teachers and specific curriculum over time. It is a powerful new tool that will complement the achievement/proficiency data (AYP) currently available. Our new MCAS page contains several DOE publications including one on the NCLB  actions required by a school/district identified as "Needing Improvement," an article about the importance of growth models, a SpEd PAC analysis of district AYP achievement data, and several SpEd PAC analyses of recently released district student growth data (SGP) broken out by Elementary School, Junior High and High School performance. In addition, we've included a copy of a letter we recently shared with the School Committee on the 2009 MCAS performance of students with special needs.
   

• 2008 ABSpEdPAC Parent/Guardian Survey Report - We want to thank everyone who took the time to fill out this survey. We have analyzed the data collected and have some interesting findings to share with you. You can check out the survey report by clicking on the following link: 2008 Parent/Guardian Survey Report.

• Updated Special Education Financial Task Force Report - A joint subcommittee of the AB School Committee and the Finance Committee has submitted its report to the School Committee titled "The Process, Cost Drivers and Cross-School Data Analysis of Special Education in the Acton Public and Acton-Boxborough Regional Schools".  The original 2003 report, titled "A Look at the Costs and Drivers of Special Education" and its appendices are available for reference.

• AB SpEd PAC's November 20th, 2008 presentation to the School Committee titled "Fall Presentation to School Committee 2008-2009 School Year".
   
• Bullying Prevention Guide - From the Governor's Task Force on Hate Crimes, the Massachusetts Commission on Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Youth, and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health: http://www.mass.gov/Eeohhs2/docs/dph/com_health/violence/bullying_prevent_guide.pdf
   

• AB SpEd PAC Transition Task Force Recommendations.  This report was presented to Pupil Services on February 6th, 2008. The PAC is working with Pupil Services to identify which recommendations can be implemented.

• New School Committee Policy and Procedure related to PAC. Previously posted letter to the ABSpEdPAC from School Committee, the SpEdPAC's response to that letter, and a copy of the PowerPoint presentation titled Exploring the Role of a PAC, which we presented to the School Committee on Dec 6th, 2007.

• ABSpEdPAC Meeting Minutes: We have added a tab in our navigation bar for a page that includes the minutes from each PAC meeting.

• New resource materials: We have added some new reference materials to our Links and Resources page, including NCLD's Idea 2004 Parent Guide, FCSN's Guide to Selecting an Advocate, and Closing the IEP Deal.

• New district guidance on FERPA: Pupil Services has recently released information regarding the Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). We have included it here for your reference.

• Independent Education Evaluation (IEE) Forms: After working closely with the AB SpEd PAC over the last year to clarify the district's practice regarding the completion of private evaluation forms, Pupil Services has published a practice titled Outside Agency Forms.  In addition, the AB SpEd PAC has updated their Guidance on IEE Forms to reflect the district's newly published practice. We have also posted the Federation's FAQ sheet regarding IEEs. We hope you will find this information helpful.

• New Boxborough Special Education PAC Website: Boxborough has recently created a new website for their PAC www.bsepac.org, which serves the Boxboro School District (K-6). For more information about the Boxborough SEPAC contact Nancy Settle-Murphy at nancy@guidedinsights.com or 978-263-0552, or Lorrie Clark at lorrie.clark.9@gmail.com.
   

General Information:

• Email Lists: We have two email lists, which circulate up-to-date news.  

  • Abspedpac General List: For current Acton and Boxborough Special Education Parent Advisory Council (A/B SpEd PAC) information, we invite anyone interested in Special Education issues in Acton and Boxborough to join our general email list.  The general PAC list distributes announcements of workshops, conferences, and other general special education announcements that are of interest to everyone who works with special education students. Parents, special education administrators, and some school committee members now receive these mailings.  To subscribe, please contact PAC General List with a message stating that you would like to be added to the general PAC list.

  • Parent_2_Parent List: We also have a PAC Parent Support list that is solely for parent support information, such as parent-to-parent communications, and only parents are included on this list. If you would like to subscribe, please contact PAC Support List with a message stating that you would like to be added to the PAC parent support list.

• Our Calendar of Events  - This calendar includes special education related presentations, meetings, and workshops in Acton, Boxborough and surrounding communities. To add an event, email the event name, date, time, description, contact information and/or link to nsherburne@mindspring.com.  The calendar is updated about once a week, so get your events in early!

• Would you like to become more involved in the PAC?  
  Please see How Can I Become More Involved?
   
• For further information about the AB SpEd PAC contact Nancy Sherburne at nsherburne@mindspring.com.
   

Special Reports:

• June 2007 - The National Center for Learning Disabilities' web page No Child Left Behind Report Card includes two new reports Rewards and Roadblocks: How Special Education Students are Faring under No Child Left Behind and State Testing Evaluations: Their Value and Validity.

• October 2003 - The Acton-Boxborough School Committee prepared, "A Look at the Costs and Drivers of Special Education" and related Appendices.
   

This page was last updated on 12/31/11.

Website Coordinator:  Karl Brace
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