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Iowa school staff, parents weigh in on proposed AEA changes at public hearing [1]

['Robin Opsahl', 'More From Author', '- February']

Date: 2024-02-21

House lawmakers heard from Iowa teachers, school district staff and parents in a public hearing Wednesday on their proposal to make changes to Iowa’s Area Education Agencies. Some speakers remained concerned about potential privatization of special education services, while others urged more control for school districts.

Legislators held the public hearing to discuss House File 2612, a bill approved by the House Education Committee last week and available for consideration by the full House.

While Area Education Agencies would continue to provide special education services as is, the bill proposes making some changes to the funding model. Federal special education funding would go directly to AEAs, while state and property tax special education funding would go to school districts, which would then be required to use AEAs to meet the specialized support requirements for students with disabilities through their Individualized Education Programs.

The legislation would also begin allowing school districts to contract with private entities and businesses for general education and media services, currently provided through AEAs, in the 2025-2026 school year. AEAs could still be hired by school districts to provide these services through “fee for service” contracts.

Additionally, the bill would create a task force to study AEAs and make recommendations before the next legislative session on how to improve the system.

Jamie Orozco-Nagel thanked House lawmakers for listening to Iowans, calling it a “substantial improvement from the governor’s bill.” But she also questioned some of the House bill’s components, including potential issues with operational sharing of AEA resources between schools under the new model, the creation of Department of Education oversight positions and pay caps for AEA administrators.

“I don’t think we should just be making changes for change’s sake.” Orozco-Nagel said. “I think we should really do the investigation of what would make improvements for Iowa’s children.

While some speakers brought up specific problems they had with the House proposal, the public hearing comes in the footsteps of a larger discussion on AEAs sparked by Gov. Kim Reynolds. Her bill would allow school districts to seek contracts with private companies for special education services. Many of the people at the hearing spoke for and against allowing school districts to seek private services to fill special education requirements — a component not included in the House bill.

Reynolds, who named her AEA proposal a top priority for the legislative session, said changes are needed in the AEA system in order to address problems identified in a report released by the Guidehouse consulting firm. The report found that Iowa spends more on special education per-pupil than the national average, but that Iowa special education students scored lower than the national average on National Assessment of Educational Progress tests.

Jacob Bolson, president of the Hubbard-Radcliffe Board of Education, said at the public hearing that the Guidehouse report was “riddled with misleading information” and statistics that have been positioned to paint the AEA system in a negative light. He cited commentary by Ted Stilwill, a former director of the state Department of Education under Govs. Terry Branstad and Tom Vilsack, that questions the conclusions reached by Gatehouse.

Bolson said that as an elected official serving a small, rural school district, he had “yet to definitively understand what the problem is that the governor and the Legislature are trying to solve.” He also said some parts of the House bill could hurt rural and small school districts.

“When a family of four non-English-speaking children spontaneously arrives at our elementary school in Radcliffe, who do we call for help?” Bolson said. “Today, we can immediately tap into AEA resources, because they are available by the consortium operational model. That will be gone with this plan, because the agility is removed with the ‘pay for service’ model.”

Many parents, teachers and AEA staff shared their personal stories of working with AEAs and the benefits provided to Iowa families in January subcommittee meetings, arguing the governor’s proposal would hurt available resources and outcomes for students with disabilities.

A version of the governor’s bill, amended by the Senate Education Committee, is also available for discussion by the Senate. Senate File 2386 includes changes that school districts will directly receive 90% of the amount calculated for students’ special education services each year, funds which could be used to contract with AEAs or other service providers, while 10% would go to AEAs directly beginning in fiscal year 2026. The Senate bill would also make a split for general education and media services, with 60% going directly to districts and 40% going to AEAs.

Some speakers at the public hearing like David Smith, superintendent of Spirit Lake Community Schools, asked for House lawmakers to not advance a “watered-down bill,” and to give special education funding directly to school districts.

“The system has been in place for a long time, and where we live, it doesn’t work,” Smith said. “It hasn’t worked. We don’t think it’s going to work in the future. We’re asking very directly that you allow us opportunity, allow us in Spirit Lake the ability to pick and choose what we want to do. Allow the flow-through dollars that are dedicated to us that go directly to the AEAs to come to us, so we can choose how we want to spend those dollars to best meet the needs of our students.”

Other speakers said that while there are problems to be addressed with the AEA system, the privatization model would not help fix shortcomings in special education. Jill Neas, an early childhood special education consultant with Heartland AEA, said that without the AEAs, services would cost much more for individual school districts. She said digital services — including books, articles and research materials available online — currently provided by AEAs cost approximately $4 per student, but would cost school districts $75 per student if purchased individually.

Neas said services now available to Iowa families and students are being debated because “an out-of-state company thinks it knows what’s best for Iowans,” and asked lawmakers to listen to Iowans and educators about the importance of AEAs.

“While there may be elements of this program we can improve, reinventing the programs and services through private businesses, or the Iowa Department of Public Education, is not the answer,” Neas said.

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