|
Disciplinary
Educational Placements
In 1995, the Texas legislature created two new
separate disciplinary placements for students committing serious
offenses. The legislature required counties with over 125,000 residents
to develop a juvenile justice alternative education program
(JJAEP). (1)
The JJAEP is responsible for educating juveniles who receive
mandatory expulsions from school for conduct found by a court to
constitute one of the serious offenses detailed in the Texas Education
Code. (2)
The court (not the school district) will refer the juvenile
to the JJAEP. A school district may also contract with the JJAEP
to educate juveniles receiving a discretionary expulsion for other
serious offenses listed by statute (3)
or students who persistently misbehave in another disciplinary
placement.(4)
Most students are placed in a JJAEP through a school’s
exercise of discretion.(5)
The second,
and most commonly used, disciplinary placement created in 1995 is
for students who have not been expelled. Under state law, each school
district must have two disciplinary alternative education programs
(DAEPs), one for elementary students and one for older students.(6)
The DAEP is
responsible for educating students who require a disciplinary placement
but have not been expelled and sent to a JJAEP. State law requires
a school to send to the DAEP students it reasonably believes have
committed specified offenses.The school must schedule a conference
with the student’s parent or guardian within three days of
removing the student to the DAEP. (7)
Most commonly, the school district exercises its broad discretion
to place a student in a DAEP.
(8)
A school can place a student in a DAEP under any circumstances
detailed in its student code of conduct. (9)
A school may also place a student in a DAEP if the student has ever
been adjudicated delinquent or placed on probation for an "offense
against the person" (regardless of when and where the conduct
occurred or whether the student successfully complied with any court
sanctions) as long as the school determines that the student’s
presence "threatens the safety of other students or teachers,"
"will be detrimental to the educational process," or "is
not in the best interests of the district’s students."
(10)
Students and their guardians cannot appeal
such a determination. (11)
|
Key
Points
•
In recent years, Texas schools have used their discretion to move
a disproportionately high number of special education students to
JJAEP and DAEP disciplinary placements.
•
Last year, 70% of students in disciplinary placements were moved
out of their original school setting through the school’s exercise
of discretion under state law.
•
Federal law limits the school’s discretion regarding children
receiving special education services by requiring that the children
with disabilities be educated in the least restrictive environment
possible.
•
Current data does not explain why so many special education students
are moved to a more restrictive disciplinary setting.
|
|
|
The graph (right) is based on three years’ worth
of data collected by the Texas Education Agency. (12)
It shows that DAEP placements are much more common than JAEP placements.
In addition, discretionary placements of either type far outnumber
mandatory placements.
Disproportion
of Children with Serious Emotional Disturbances in Disciplinary
Placements
Disciplining a child is more complicated when the child committing
the offense has a serious emotional disturbance and is receiving
special education services under the Individuals with Disabilities
Education Act (IDEA). Under federal and state law, a team consisting
of school personnel and the child’s representatives must make
any decisions about a change in placement. (13)
Prior to any change in placement for disciplinary reasons, the team
must find the following conditions to be true:
•
The child’s individualized education program (IEP) and placement
were appropriate
• The school provided the special education services,
supplementary aids and services, and behavior intervention strategies
consistent with the child’s IEP and placement
• The child’s disability did not impair his or
her ability to understand the impact and consequences of the undesirable
behavior
• The child’s disability did not impair his or
her ability to control the undesirable behavior. (14)
If any of the
four conditions were not true, the school cannot discipline the
child but instead must devise a program that better meets the child’s
needs. Under such circumstances, the child’s placement could
be changed only if the team determines that a change is needed for
educational (not punitive) purposes. A special education student
cannot be placed in an alternative education program solely for
educational purposes. (15)
 It
is difficult to access data establishing what proportion of special
education students have a serious emotional disturbance. In the
2003-04 school year, only 36,444 (7.2%) of the 509,401 students
receiving special education services were identified as having a
primary diagnosis of "emotional disturbance." (16)
Yet for the year 2003, the state estimated that 150,943 children
fell within the priority population of emotionally disturbed children.
(17)
It is possible that a number of students receiving special education
services for other disabilities such as a learning disorder also
have a serious emotional disturbance.
In Texas, a high proportion of students in disciplinary placements
are receiving special education services. Although 11.6% of the
total student population received special education services in
2003-04, (18)
25.8% of the students expelled to JJAEPs and 23.4% of students removed
to DAEPs were children receiving special education services.(19)
Special education students also received a disproportionate share
of suspensions (based on their numbers in the overall student population),
with special education students composing 24.1% of students receiving
out-of-school suspensions and 20.2% of in-school suspensions.(20)
The data collected does not indicate why schools used their discretion
to discipline a disproportionate number of special education students.
Consequences
of Disciplinary Placements for Special Education Students
A disciplinary change in placement can have a significant detrimental
impact on a child receiving special education services. Because
DAEPs are exempt from many of the requirements for regular schools,
(21)
some opt to provide students with only a four-hour day, the minimum
required for state funding purposes.
(22) Programming for high-achieving students with emotional
disorders may be even more restricted. Those students may lose access
to a more advanced curriculum, such as advanced placement classes
or foreign languages, because disciplinary placements often have
more limited academic programs. (23)
The transfer of large numbers of special education students to disciplinary
placements may also benefit a school in ways unrelated to the education
of the student or the preservation of a productive learning environment.
A change in placement moves the child outside a campus’ accountability
system for educational progress. Beginning with the 2004 school
year, "students who move from campus to campus within a district
are also excluded from the campus Texas Assessment of Knowledge
and Skills (TAKS) or State-Developed Alternative Assessment (SDAA)."
(24)
Students who are in a disciplinary placement at any point in the
school year will be tested, but the test results count at the district-level
only and do not affect the accountability and ranking of any individual
school campus.
The disproportionate placement of special education students in
restrictive disciplinary settings merits further investigation.
A significant majority of students are moved to disciplinary placements
at an administrator’s discretion; it would be helpful to know
more about which students are moved and why. Districts vary dramatically
in how they use their DAEPs. Because the state’s evaluation
of a DAEP’s performance is in part based on the "percentage
of a district’s students with disabilities placed in a [DAEP]"
with discretionary and mandatory placements measured separately,
(27)
schools should collect sufficient data to document the appropriate
use of disciplinary placements for all their students. Teachers,
parents, school administrators, and legislators need to assess this
data to ensure that all students are educated in the least restrictive
environment possible.
Recommendations
The
Texas Education Agency already collects much relevant data about
DAEPs through the Public Education Information Management System
(PEIMS), the Academic Excellence Indicator System (AEIS), and the
TEA Financial Accountability System, but most of the data is not
readily accessible to individuals outside the Agency. The following
data should be analyzed and reported on a district-by-district basis:
• The number of special education students in DAEPs annually
(PEIMS Section IV)
• The number of days a special education child attends a DAEP
(PEIMS Section X)
• The age distribution of children in a DAEP (25) (PEIMS Section
X)
• The race and/or ethnicity of children in a DAEP (PEIMS Section
X)
• The number of discretionary and mandatory placements of youth
in DAEPs (PEIMS Section X)
• The number of multiple placements of youth in DAEPs (PEIMS
Section X)
• The average cost per day to educate a child placed in the
DAEP (TEA Financial Accountability System)
• The average cost per day to educate a child placed in a special
education classroom (TEA Financial Accountability System)
• The number of DAEP sessions in held per day on the local
DAEP campus (26) (PEIMS Section X)
• The average TAKS score for all children attending the DAEP
at any point during the school year (PEIMS Section X)
• The number of children who attended a DAEP within the school
year and dropped out of school (AEIS)
• The number of students who attended a DAEP in the previous
year or the current year and were retained (AEIS)
• The completion rates for the past four years of any student
who attended a DAEP for any length of time (AEIS)
References
1)
Texas Education Code §37.011(a).
2) Texas Education Code §37.011(b); Texas Education Code §37.007(a),
(d), (e).
3) Texas Education Code §37.007(b)
4) Texas Education Code §37.007(c). Under this provision, a
student must be in a disciplinary alternative education program
(DAEP) before a placement in the JJAEP for persistent misbehavior.
5) Texas Education Agency, Annual 425 Report.
6) Texas Education Code §37.008; TEC §38.006(f).
7) Texas Education Code §37.009.
8) Texas Education Agency, Annual 425 Report.
9) Texas Education Code §37.001(a)(2). In addition to placement
in a DAEP, a student may receive a citation issued by a school peace
officer for a violation of the student code of conduct. TEA does
not collect data on the number of such citations or the dollar amount
of the fines.
10) Texas Education Code §37.0081(a).
11) Texas Education Code §37.0081(b).
12) Texas Education Agency, Annual 425 Report.
13) 34 C.F.R. §300.552(a)(1); Texas Education Code §37.004(a).
14) 20 U.S.C. §1415(k)(4); Texas Education Code §37.004.
15) Texas Education Code §37.004(c).
16) Texas Education Agency, Students Receiving Special Education
Services by Disability and Age, Fall 2003-2004 PEIMS Data.
17) Texas Department of State Health Services, 2001-2005 Child/Adolescent
Mental Health Prevalence/Priority Population Data, p. 23, http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/mhreports/01%2D05revisedmhchildpre%2Dpripopdata.pdf.
The Department raised its estimate to 152,174 children for 2004.
The priority population is defined as "children and adolescents
ages 3 through 17 years with a diagnosis of mental illness who exhibit
serious emotional, behavioral, or mental disorders and who: (1)
have a serious functional impairment (GAF of 50 or less currently
or in the past year); or (2) are at risk of disruption of a preferred
living or child care environment due to psychiatric symptoms; or
(3) are enrolled in a school system’s special education program
because of a serious emotional disturbance." Texas Department
of Mental Health and Mental Retardation, Strategic Plan for FY
2003-2007, p. 57, http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/mhreports/SP03-07final.pdf.
18) Texas Education Agency, Academic Excellence Indicator System
2003-04 State Profile Report.
19) According to the Texas Education Agency’s Annual 425
Report (2004), in 2003-04, 5,890 students (1,520 special education
students) were expelled to JJAEPs and 103,696 students (24,273 special
education students) were removed to DAEPs. These numbers differ
from the statistics in the chart in Figure 1 as these numbers are
of unduplicated students, whereas the chart tracks the number of
placements and an individual student may have had more than one
placement in a school year.
20) According to the Texas Education Agency’s Annual 425
Report (2004), in 2003-04, 280,365 students (67,572 special
education students) received an out-of-school suspension and 605,450
students (122,003 special education students) received an in-school
suspension.
21) Texas Education Code §37.008(c) states that a DAEP "is
not subject to a requirement imposed by this title [Public Education],
other than a limitation on liability, a reporting requirement, or
a requirement imposed by this chapter [Discipline; Law and Order]
or by Chapter 39 [Public School System Accountability]."
22) PEIMS Handbook, Sec. III 5-2, Sec. X 2-4; Texas Education Code
§42.006(b).
23) According to state law, "academically, the mission of disciplinary
alternative education programs shall be to enable students to perform
at grade level." Texas Education Code §37.008(m). See
also Texas Education Code §37.001(h), 34 C.F.R. §300.121(d)(2).
24) Texas Education Agency, 2004 Accountability Manual, Section
I, p. 11.
25) A student younger than 6 years cannot be placed in a DAEP unless
the child received a mandatory expulsion for bringing a firearm
to school. Texas Education Code §37.006(l), §37.007(e)(2).
26) DAEPs that provide only four hours of education per day as permitted
by Texas Education Code §37.008(c) may schedule two or even
three four-hour sessions per day.
27) 19 Texas Administrative Code §97.1021(f)(3).
|
|
