BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SB 210
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Date of Hearing: July 15, 2015
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Patrick O'Donnell, Chair
SB
210 (Galgiani) - As Amended July 1, 2015
SENATE VOTE: 40-0
SUBJECT: Special education: deaf and hard-of-hearing children:
language benchmarks
SUMMARY: Requires the California Department of Education (CDE)
to select benchmarks for tracking the progress of deaf and hard
of hearing students in language and literacy development,
establishes an advisory committee to recommend benchmarks, and
requires information from use of the benchmarks to be used
locally and to be reported to the CDE. Specifically, this bill:
1)Requires the CDE's Deaf and Hard of Hearing unit, and the
CDE's deaf education resource centers located in Fremont and
Riverside to jointly select language benchmarks from existing
standardized norms for purposes of monitoring and tracking
deaf and hard-of-hearing children's expressive and receptive
language acquisition and developmental stages toward English
literacy.
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2)Requires that the language benchmarks be selected from the
language benchmarks recommended by an advisory committee
created by the bill, and be used by a child's individualized
family service plan (IFSP) team or individualized education
program (IEP) team to assess the progress of the child's
language development using both or one of the languages of
American Sign Language (ASL) and English.
3)Requires individual data on the progress of each student on
these benchmarks be reported to the department by the child's
IFSP team or IEP team.
4)Requires, by March 1, 2016, the CDE to provide the advisory
committee a list of existing language benchmarks from existing
standardized norms, along with any relevant information held
by the department regarding those language benchmarks.
5)Requires, by June 1, 2016, the advisory committee to recommend
language benchmarks for selection.
6)Requires, by June 30, 2016, the department shall inform the
advisory committee of which language benchmarks were selected.
7)Requires the CDE to track developmental stages that are
equivalent to a child's linguistically age-appropriate peers
who are not deaf or hard of hearing, with the goal of
assisting children who are deaf or hard of hearing to become
kindergarten-ready.
8)Defines "English," for purposes of the section created by this
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bill, includes spoken English, written English, or English
with the use of visual supplements.
9)Requires a child's IFSP team or IEP team, if a child does not
demonstrate progress in expressive and receptive language
skills according to the applicable language benchmarks, to
explain in detail the reasons why the child is not meeting the
benchmarks or progressing towards the age-appropriate
benchmark, and recommend specific strategies, services, and
programs that shall be provided to assist the child's success
toward English literacy.
10)Requires the CDE to disseminate the language benchmarks to
IFSP and IEP teams, including parents and guardians of deaf or
hard-of-hearing children, and provide materials and training
to ensure appropriate language growth as part of the child's
existing IFSP or IEP in order to assist deaf or
hard-of-hearing children in becoming linguistically ready for
kindergarten using both or one of the languages of ASL and
English.
11)Requires the SPI to establish an ad hoc advisory committee
for purposes of soliciting input from experts on the selection
of language benchmarks for children who are deaf or hard of
hearing that are equivalent to those for children who are not
deaf or hard of hearing.
12)Requires that the committee consist of 13 volunteers, the
majority of whom are deaf or hard of hearing, and all of whom
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are within the field of education for the deaf and hard of
hearing. Requires the committee to consist of:
a) one parent of a child who is deaf or hard of hearing who
uses the dual languages of ASL and English
b) one parent of a child who is deaf or hard of hearing who
uses only spoken English, with or without visual
supplements
c) one credentialed teacher of deaf and hard-of-hearing
pupils who use the dual languages of ASL and English
d) one credentialed teacher of deaf and hard-of-hearing
pupils from a state certified nonpublic, nonsectarian
school
e) one expert who researches language outcomes for deaf and
hard-of-hearing children using ASL and English
f) one expert who researches language outcomes for deaf and
hard-of-hearing children using spoken English, with or
without visual supplements
g) one credentialed teacher of deaf and hard-of-hearing
pupils whose expertise is in curriculum and instruction in
ASL and English
h) one credentialed teacher of deaf and hard-of-hearing
pupils whose expertise is in curriculum and instruction in
spoken English, with or without visual supplements
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i) one advocate for the teaching and use of the dual
languages of ASL and English
j) one advocate for the teaching and use of spoken English,
with or without visual supplements
aa) one early intervention specialist who works with deaf
and hard-of-hearing infants and toddlers using the dual
languages of ASL and English
bb) one credentialed teacher of deaf and hard-of-hearing
pupils whose expertise is in ASL and English language
assessment
cc) one speech pathologist from spoken English, with or
without the use of visual supplements
1)Requires the CDE to, by January 1, 2018, develop specific
action plans and regulations to fully implement the language
benchmark assessment protocol and processes.
2)States that this section applies only to children from birth
to five years of age.
3)Makes implementation of this section subject to an
appropriation being made for purposes of this section in the
annual Budget Act or another statute.
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EXISTING LAW:
1)Requires that children with disabilities age birth to three
years are provided with an IFSP, and that students with
disabilities age three to 22 years are provided with an
individualized education IEP.
2)Requires each student's IEP team to:
a) Consider, among other things, the communication needs of
the student, and in the case of a student who is deaf or
hard of hearing, consider the student's language and
communication needs, opportunities for direct
communications with peers and professional personnel in the
student's language and communication mode, academic level,
and full range of needs, including opportunities for direct
instruction in the student's language and communication
mode.
b) Specifically discuss the communication needs of the
student, consistent with "Deaf Students Education Services
Policy Guidance" including, among other things, the
following:
1. The student's primary language mode and language,
which may include the use of spoken language with or
without visual cues, or the use of sign language, or a
combination of both
2. Appropriate, direct, and ongoing language access to
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special education teachers and other specialists who are
proficient in the student's primary language mode and
language consistent with existing law regarding teacher
training requirements
3. Services necessary to ensure
communication-accessible academic instructions, school
services, and extracurricular activities
1)Establishes the California School for the Deaf, Northern
California (Fremont), and the California School for the Deaf,
Southern California (Riverside) and three diagnostic centers,
all under the administration of the CDE.
2)Establishes the Deaf Student's Bill of Rights which states,
among other things, that it is essential that hard-of-hearing
and deaf students have an education in which their unique
communication mode is respected, utilized, and developed; that
students have an education with a sufficient number of
language mode peers with whom they can communicate; and that
students' parents be involved in determining the extent,
content, and purpose of their educational programs.
3)Establishes the California Early Intervention Services Act,
commonly known as the Early Start Program, to provide various
early intervention services for infants and toddlers who have
disabilities to enhance their development and to minimize the
potential for developmental delays.
FISCAL EFFECT: According to the Senate Appropriations
Committee, cost pressure potentially in the low millions to fund
new local requirements to implement and report upon the
identified language benchmarks; and cost pressures to the CDE in
the low hundreds of thousands, and a possible increase in costs
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related to mediations and due process hearings.
COMMENTS:
Need for the bill. The author's office states, "Children who are
deaf and hard of hearing have the same ability and capability to
learn language as their peers who are not deaf and hard of
hearing. The ability and right to develop one's language is
central to the human experience and a necessary prerequisite to
any literacy, cognitive, emotional, linguistic, academic, and
social growth. Without language, there can be no education.
Current statistics show that many children who are deaf and hard
of hearing arrive at Kindergarten with severe language delays
and in many cases, language deprivation. These children begin
Kindergarten without the necessary language skills to acquire
the knowledge and academic competences, which will allow them to
be successful in school and life. Currently, there are no
requirements to assess the language development of children
birth to five who are deaf and hard of hearing or to monitor
their progress in the languages most commonly used by
individuals who are deaf and hard of hearing in the United
States: American Sign Language and English."
Language deprivation among deaf and hard of hearing students in
California. According the CDE, in California there are
approximately 17,000 students, ages birth to 22, who are deaf or
hard of hearing. The CDE notes that historically most deaf and
hard of hearing students struggle academically because of their
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limited access to language. This lack of access to language,
sometimes called "language deprivation," can cause language
delays, and because language and cognition are closely related,
language deprivation may lead to cognitive delays.
However, research has demonstrated that children who are deaf
are identified and enrolled in appropriate Early Start services
by six months of age can develop language and cognitive skills
commensurate with their non-deaf peers.
The largest data set representing the language development of
deaf and hard of hearing students on standardized tests comes
from a longitudinal study using the Stanford Achievement Test.
This study began in 1969 and ran for over thirty years. It
measured normative performance of deaf and hard-of-hearing
students ages 8 to 18 on reading comprehension tests, and found
that, between 1974 and 2003, median performance never exceeded
the fourth-grade equivalent for any age cohort. It also noted
persistent problems in designing a valid and reliable way to
measure the academic performance of deaf and hard of hearing
students.
Data from the 2008 administration of the California Standards
Tests of English language arts show that less than 10% of deaf
and 23% of hard of hearing students scored at the "proficient"
or higher levels. 51% of deaf students scored at the "far below
basic" level, the lowest category of performance. This is the
only publicly available state data disaggregated for these
students.
Universal newborn screening creates new opportunity to intervene
in critical early years. In numerous policy statements and
recommendations relating to the education of deaf and hard of
hearing students there is universal recognition that early
identification and intervention is critical to language
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development.
As late as 2000, the average age of identification of deaf and
hard of hearing children was 2.5 years. Recognition of the
importance of early identification has led to policies
increasing newborn screening from 46% in 1999 to 98% in 2011,
according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Research has demonstrated that identification of hearing
difficulty prior to six months is associated with significantly
better language scores than identification after 6 months of
age. For children with normal cognitive abilities, this
advantage holds true across ages, communication modes, degrees
of hearing loss, socioeconomic status, gender, race, and the
presence or absence of additional disabilities.
One longitudinal study found that the age of intervention
accounted for over 55% of the difference in language ability at
age five. Other research found that parental involvement
accounts for 35% of language ability differences at age five.
An estimated 96% of deaf and hard of hearing children are born
to hearing parents, who often lack information and skill which
could help them promote language and literacy development in the
critical early years.
Recognizing the importance of early intervention, as well as the
vital role of parents, this bill is intended to provide parents,
educators, and policy makers tools for addressing language
deprivation among deaf and hard of hearing children during the
children's early years. The Committee may wish to consider what
progress could be in promoting language development now that
earlier identification has been realized and early intervention
is so clearly indicated.
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No publicly available state data on deaf and hard of hearing
language outcomes. While the CDE collects data on the progress
of students with disabilities in English language arts in grades
3 - 8 and 11, this data is reported as the performance of all
students with disabilities, with no disaggregation by
disability. And while the state collects data on language
development of children with disabilities ages birth to five at
state funded child care/development and preschool programs for
purposes of reporting to the federal government, it is also not
disaggregated by disability.
As a result it is not possible to examine the language
development of deaf and hard of hearing students, or view trends
over time to measure the impact of policy and programmatic
changes. The proponents of this bill support such reporting,
and a reporting requirement is included in the staff recommended
amendments listed at the end of this analysis.
Desired Results Developmental Profile provides information
useful for both individual children and state policy. To meet
federal requirements to monitor the educational and
developmental progress of children with disabilities, the CDE
has developed the Desired Results Developmental Profile
instrument (DRDP). The DRDP is an assessment instrument based
on a developmental continuum from early infancy to kindergarten
entry. The DRDP is administered twice every year to children in
state funded child care/development and preschool programs, and
provides an individual profile of a child's developmental and
school readiness skills in eight domains, including language and
literacy, math and science, social-emotional development, and
English language development. Children's development is
presented along a continuum using levels labeled responding,
exploring, building, and integrating.
The CDE uses the results of the DRDP assessment to meet federal
accountability requirements under the individuals with
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Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) (known in this context as DRDP
Access), and it is used with children who deaf and hard of
hearing. The DRDP was developed according to the principles of
universal design, and allows children the opportunity to
demonstrate their knowledge and skills in a variety of ways.
Each child's DRDP data is used to provide an overall summary of
progress, determined by comparing each child's level of
functioning and individual progress to a sample of same-aged
peers. Special Education Local Plan Areas (SELPAs) are
required to report DRDP assessment data to the CDE through the
California Special Education Management Information System
(CASEMIS). The DRDP is aligned to the Common Core state
standards for kindergarten.
The DRDP is an evidence-based, valid and reliable assessment.
DRDP statewide data can be disaggregated by disability and, as
required by this bill, reports can be created for deaf and hard
of hearing students' performance relative to their non-deaf and
hard of hearing peers. The Committee may wish to consider that
the proponents of this bill express concern that this assessment
does not adequately measure the language development of deaf and
hard of hearing children. For that reason, this bill, as
proposed to be amended (see Recommended Amendments) would
require that the advisory committee created by the bill provide
recommendations on the design and administration of the DRDP for
deaf and hard of hearing children, and also require that a
version of the DRDP be developed to meet the needs of these
children.
Infant/Toddler and Preschool Learning Foundations. The
California Infant/Toddler Learning and Development Foundations
were developed by the CDE, in collaboration with many
researchers and stakeholders. The Infant/Toddler foundations
were released in 2009. The California Preschool Learning
Foundations were developed by the California Department of
Education, in collaboration with many researchers and
stakeholders. These foundations include three volumes. Volume
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1, released on January 22, 2008, includes language and literacy,
and English language development. The Learning Foundations are
aligned to the Common Core state standards for kindergarten.
Best Practices for Early Start for Infants and Toddlers who are
Deaf and Hard of Hearing. To help ensure that families of
infants with hearing loss in California received appropriate
services, the CDE established a Deaf and Hard of Hearing Early
Start Workgroup. The Workgroup was tasked with developing a
document to provide guidance to Early Start providers, parents,
and others in the appropriate provision of early intervention
services. In 2005, the Workgroup published "Best Practices for
Early Start for Infants and Toddlers who are Deaf and Hard of
Hearing."
Resource Guide for Parents of Infants and Toddlers Who are Deaf
or Hard of Hearing. In 2011, a panel of parents convened with
the CDE to create a guide for parents that contains information
to help parents understand the services that may be provided
through an IFSP and IEP, with a focus on language development.
The purpose of the Resource Guide for Parents of Infants and
Toddlers Who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing, released by the CDE in
2013, is to provide parents with an introduction to the benefits
of both signed and spoken language, as well as to various
communication tools and educational approaches.
Can the educator tool required by this bill function as
intended? The recommended amendments below (2) require the
creation of a version of the DRDP for use with deaf and hard of
hearing children to measure language and literacy development.
This proposal raises several questions which the Committee may
wish to consider:
1)Is the DRDP sufficient for use with deaf and hard of hearing
students to measure language and literacy development? The
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CDE states that it is, but proponents of this bill are
concerned that it does not adequately measure language
development for deaf and hard of hearing students. The CDE's
DRDP contractor has expressed interest in receiving input from
the deaf and hard of hearing advisory committee created by
this bill. Amendments proposed below specifically authorize
the committee to make such recommendations.
2)Can a version of the DRDP which meets the requirements of this
bill remain a valid and reliable instrument capable of
accurately measuring the language development of these
children compared to typically developing children? CDE's
contractor has indicated that they are considering developing
a "readiness zone" model of the existing assessment, but also
note that any changes to the assessment must be made on the
basis of empirical evidence, recognized standards of test
construction, and remain consistent with principles of
authentic assessment.
3)Is it an appropriate precedent to require the development of a
version of an assessment designed for all pupils for a
specific group of students? Proponents of the bill argue that
it is, because deaf and hard of hearing children's
communication requires assessment modifications, and because
language deprivation is such a serious, pervasive, and
long-standing issue. However this bill might create pressure
for the CDE to develop other versions of the DRDP - an
assessment designed to be administered to all students.
Recommended amendments. Staff recommends the following
amendments:
1)Require the development of a resource for parents for the
purpose of monitoring deaf and hard-of-hearing children's
(ages 0-5) language and literacy development. The resource
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would be appropriate for use with deaf and hard of hearing
children, present milestones in terms of typical development
of all children, be aligned to existing state standards and
assessments, be written for ease of use and clarity for
parents, make clear that it is not a formal assessment, and
that parents can bring the resource to an IEP or IFSP meeting
for the purpose of sharing their observations about their
children's development.
2)Require the development of a version of an existing tool for
educators which can be used to assess the language and
literacy development of children who are deaf and hard of
hearing. The tool would be in a standardized format that
shows stages of language development and outcomes, present
language and literacy development in terms of age-referenced
readiness zones, be appropriate, in both content and
administration, for use with deaf and hard of hearing
children. It could be used in the development and
modification of IEPs and IFSPs, and could reflect the
recommendations of the advisory committee established by the
bill.
3)Require the CDE to disseminate the parent resource and
educator tool to parents and local educational agencies
respectively, and provide materials and training on its use.
4)Require the advisory committee to recommend language
development milestones for inclusion in the parent resource,
and authorize it to make recommendations on the design and
administration of the educator tool.
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5)Authorize the advisory to committee to also advise the
department or its contractor on the content and administration
of the existing instrument used to assess the development of
children with disabilities pursuant to federal law to ensure
its appropriate use with those children, and to make
recommendations regarding future research to improve the
measurement of progress of deaf and hard of hearing children
in language and literacy.
6)Require the CDE, beginning in 2017, to annually produce a
report, using existing data reported in compliance with the
federal state performance plan on pupils with disabilities, on
the language and literacy development of deaf and hard of
hearing children (including those who have other
disabilities), relative to their peers who are not deaf or
hard of hearing, and post this report on the department's
website.
7)Require that all activities conducted to implement the act be
in consistent with federal law on students with disabilities
and privacy of student information.
8)Define language milestones to mean milestones of development
used in existing state instruments used to meet the
requirements of federal law.
Prior legislation. AB 455 (Medina) of the 2013-2014 Session
would have required the Superintendent of Public Instruction to
develop standards in Braille and American Sign Language that are
aligned to the common core standards. AB 455 was held in the
Senate.
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AB 2072 (Mendoza) of the 2009-10 Session would have required the
Department of Health Care Services to develop an unbiased,
comprehensive, evidence-based informational pamphlet for
newborns and infants identified as deaf or hard of hearing about
visual and auditory communication and language options that is
sufficient to allow a parent to make an informed decision on
which options to choose for his or her child. AB 2072 was vetoed
by the Governor.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION:
Support
California Association of the Deaf (sponsor)
California Coalition of Options Schools (sponsor)
Center for Early Intervention on Deafness (sponsor)
California Coalition of Agencies Serving the Deaf and Hard of
Hearing
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California Educators of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing
California Hands and Voices
Center for Early Intervention on Deafness
Deaf and Hard of Hearing Service Center
NorCal Services for Deaf and Hard of Hearing
Opposition
None on file
Analysis Prepared by:Tanya Lieberman / ED. / (916)
319-2087