Workgroup 3—Delivery Systems
 meeting minutes from
 7/10/2007

Group Leader: Rebecca Cort
Attendees: Michael Grossfeld and Mary Curtis (via video conference); Susan Constantino Harouna Ba, and Sheila Skippington (via telephone conference); Donna Noyes, Mark Jasinski, Judy Gerson, Sandy Rybaltowski (in Albany)

Observers: Pam Madeiras (Greenburg Traurig), Jessica Morelli (NYSAC) in Albany; Gayle Kligman (Children’s Therapy Services), Jane Ryan (All about Kids), Barbara Green (TheraCare) all by video conference.  

Absent: Lisa Timoney (NYS Division of Budget)

Facilitator: Donna Meixner               
Recorders: Tina Goodwin Segal and Denise Corbett

Introduction and Delivery Work Group Charge
After brief introductions Becky asked that the minutes from the last work group session be accepted. There were no additions or revision to the minutes. The facilitator then reviewed the agenda and the supporting information handout (materials were available electronically before the meeting and hard copy packets were available at the meeting). The following working agreements were accepted:

 After some discussion it was agreed that the role of the substitute/representative at the Work Group meetings will be broadened to include more participatory action than is possible at the full task force meetings. Since the goal of the work groups is to share information, invite expertise, and explore ideas/solutions it was agreed that all work group members or their representatives will be asked to contribute.

The task force charge was reviewed and the following section was highlighted as the most relevant for the delivery systems work group.

(3) conduct a comparative study of the systems of delivery of preschool special education programs and services in New York and other states, including their methods of financing preschool special education, and make recommendations for inclusion of the best practices from other states which shall include other states with comparable need and service levels and for changes in New York's system of delivery of such programs and services that will promote the cost-effective delivery of appropriate programs and services to preschool students with disabilities in compliance with the federal individuals with disabilities education act;

The proposed work schedule was included in the handout materials and reviewed with the members to remind everyone of the tight timelines.
 
Prioritization of the Key Issues/Areas
Becky reviewed the priority level ratings based on the rating forms she had received from work group members since the last meeting. There was nearly unanimous agreement that two of the six categories were the most important for the group to consider. These were Funding Authority and Government Structure and Quality Standards and Best Practice. The next highest priority based on the rating forms was Continuum of Service. The moderator asked for discussion of prioritizing categories. Becky asked that the group consider taking the two categories rated as the highest priority as the most important for the group to address and suggested that issues relating to continuum of service could be merged in the Quality Standards and Best Practice set of issues. Mike Grossfeld stated his perspective that the highest priority for the group to address was in the area of Standardized Testing and Training (which he had noted on the form as Other). His perspective is that this area is critical to how decisions are made about who gets services.  There was discussion about whether this fits with the role of the Delivery Systems work group. There was generally agreement that it is not the charge of this group to review or to re-write eligibility for services i.e., who gets services and who does not get services. It was agreed that the issue of standardized testing could be incorporated/considered in the discussion of Quality Standards and Best Practice.

Becky provided priority ratings from the members’ forms about the issues within each of these broad areas. After some dialogue by the group and some merging of ideas, the following framework was identified as the areas and issues that the work group would address (see Table 1)

Table 1

Further Development of Each Priority Area
Before moving on to further refining the issues/questions, Becky gave a brief overview of the results of the online Other States Survey. Some of the most salient points were that NYS has the highest percentage of preschool population receiving services, is among the highest in per pupil expenditures, and is one of only a few with a large percent of county and no LEA funding. Additional follow-up questions will be developed by this and other work groups to obtain more specific data from a few selected states to better understand their system(s) for delivering special education services. This work group will suggest that GA, PA, OH, and FL be contacted with additional follow up questions. VESID will contact NECTAC and ask if there is an additional state that should be included in the study.

When it comes to issues that are specifically within NYS, these will have to be addressed by obtaining factual data from state agency database resources; informational data from providers and counties will come from regional forums/inviting qualified experts to Work Group and/or full Task Force Meetings.
 
Table 2 is a summary of the group’s collective thinking about what the important questions are for each of the issues in the first priority area (where possible data source(s) were identified).

Table 2

During the group discussion about this first priority area, it was agreed that one of the issues generated at the initial task force meeting—Understand per child costs in benchmark states—should be referred to Work Group 2.

Table 3 is a summary of issues, questions and data sources for the second priority area.

Table 3

The discussion around this second area of issues was focused on two main points 1) the need for outcome measures or some way of knowing/documenting that a child is making progress and 2) the need to explore the relationship between “indirect” and “direct” services and how these services are designated at the time of the IEP and how they actually play out in practice.
 
Report Outline
There was a handout provided in the packet of information that provided a more detailed potential outline of the final product. The facilitator asked the group to review and provide any feedback about the report outline to Becky.
Meeting Wrap-up
The facilitator provided a quick review of the work that was accomplished. Becky agreed to present the issues and questions that Work Group 3 developed at this meeting to the full task force at the meeting next Tuesday. She asked for the group’s participation in being the spokesperson for Work Group 3 to the full task force and suggested that the responsibility for presenting at future task force meetings should be rotated among the work group members. There was general agreement with this request.   

Becky asked Harouna Ba and Sheila Skippington if they would be able to do the follow-up case studies with each of the selected states. They agreed and asked about the timeframe for the study. Becky stated that the full set of questions will be developed after the next task force meeting (Tuesday July 17th) and that the information from the case studies will need to be available by August.

The facilitator complimented the group on successfully meeting the goals for this work session and reminded everyone about upcoming meeting dates/times.

NEXT FULL TASK FORCE MEETING: TUESDAY JULY 17TH 10:00- 3:00

NEXT GROUP 3 MTG: AUGUST 6TH
TIME:  10:30-1:30
LOCATION: One Commerce Plaza