Our son, Samuel, is a junior at Concord High School. Like most 17-year-olds, he is thinking about his future plans for college and work. Unlike most juniors, Samuel uses a wheelchair and communication device to navigate the physical and academic aspects of high school.
Samuel is one of about 28,000 students in New Hampshire with an Individualized Education Plan. He loves being a student at Concord High School, and is considering options for college courses.
We credit much of his success to the hard-working educators and specialists in the Concord School District, who have maintained a spirit of open communication, high expectations, inclusion and parental involvement throughout Samuel’s 12 years in the city’s schools – all of which would be undermined by House Bill 620.
HB 620 is a destructive, unnecessary piece of legislation that would threaten the collaborative success of New Hampshire educators, students and families.
HB 620 will prevent the state Board of Education from proposing rules that exceed state or federal minimum requirements. It allows the state board to propose a rule that exceeds the minimum federal requirements “only if, and to the extent that, state statute explicitly allows the state board to exceed the minimum requirements of federal law.”
If HB 620 passed, it will trigger massive changes in education policy, and it will have a particularly devastating effect on New Hampshire’s current special education rules.
The N.H. Rules for the Education of Children with Disabilities (New Hampshire’s special education rules) were developed through a very recent (beginning in 2015) and transparent 18-month process that involved the public at every step.
The New Hampshire rules include important rights and protections that:
Support parental involvement and foster parent/school collaboration (research shows that parent involvement is a primary factor in children’s school success);
Make the IEP process more efficient, proactive and clear, reducing the likelihood of misunderstandings (New Hampshire has a very low number of due process hearings, which are both adversarial and expensive);
Protect students from harm (requirements intended to ensure student safety); and,
Provide accountability and transparency (to ensure that New Hampshire taxpayers and school districts know what is expected of them, and there is a record to prove that they are getting what they pay for).
Here are the reasons we oppose this attempt to change New Hampshire’s education laws:
HB 620 is not clear. The state Board of Education wrote in a Feb. 17 letter to the House Education Committee: “This language is problematic because it could prohibit the board from proposing rules that are necessary to implement the law but that are not specifically authorized by statute. Additionally, there has been confusion in the past as to what constitutes ‘exceeds’ with respect to state or federal minimums. Rules that are meant to clarify statutory language could be considered exceeding minimal requirements under HB 620’s provisions.”
HB 620 is unnecessary. In most cases when New Hampshire exceeds the federal minimum requirements, doing more doesn’t mean “more costly” or “more cumbersome.” In most cases, it means more clear, more supportive of parent-school partnerships, and more likely to maintain the integrity of the special education process. As Paul Leather, deputy commissioner for the state Department of Education testified before the Senate Finance Committee in 2011, reducing New Hampshire’s rules to the minimum level allowed by the federal law would not result in any cost savings at either the state or local level.
HB 620 is not fiscally responsible. Part of the purpose of special education (according to RSA 186-C) is to prepare our children for “further education, employment and independent living.” New Hampshire’s students with disabilities have among the highest graduation rates and lowest dropout rates in the nation. New Hampshire also has a higher percentage of students with disabilities who are enrolled in higher education and/or employed one year after leaving high school than the national average. This positive outcome benefits all New Hampshire citizens.
HB 620 is regressive. If New Hampshire were to pass HB 620, effectively stopping any future rules from going beyond the minimum requirements of federal or state statute, it would be a first step in eroding the critical rights and protections in the New Hampshire Rules, and would certainly lead to poorer outcomes (lower graduation rates, less parent involvement, more due process hearings, fewer students prepared for employment and/or post-secondary education after leaving high school).
HB 620 ignores the concept of local control. “Local control” means New Hampshire deciding what makes sense for New Hampshire.
On behalf of our son Samuel and the tens of thousands of New Hampshire citizens who will be negatively affected by this legislation, we urge lawmakers to kill this bill.
(Betsy McNamara and Dan Habib live in Concord.)