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Q&A
Initiatives for parent empowerment and support in special education
1:30:56
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Council Member Mercedes Narcisse inquires about funding and initiatives to empower parents and support families navigating the special education system. Chancellor Melissa Aviles-Ramos and Deputy Chancellor Christina Foti outline the DOE's efforts in this area.
- The DOE focuses on training staff to help families navigate the IEP process and supporting principals and superintendents in addressing special education issues.
- Three major initiatives for engaging families of students with IEPs are highlighted: the Beyond Access series webinars, the IEP parent member initiative, and parent training during Saturday academies.
- The Department emphasizes a comprehensive approach to support, including staff training and family empowerment.
Mercedes Narcisse
1:30:56
Thank you.
1:30:56
Your third commitment is to empower parents, families, and communities.
1:31:03
That's one of the things that I'm always fond of because I feel like parents have to be part of those decision making in the school building.
1:31:11
So I want to say thank you for that.
1:31:13
Many parents feel unheard and unsupported in navigating the special education system.
1:31:22
What funding is being allocated toward parents advocacy programs and other resources to help families better access the services that children are entitled to.
Melissa Aviles-Ramos
1:31:33
Thank you so much council member, and before we talk the specifics about the budget, I just wanna note that part of this is also making sure that we are training our staff on how to help families navigate the IEP process, that's work that Christina Foti's office has done a tremendous amount in, but also making sure that we're supporting our principals and our superintendents where they have the staffing, where they have the support, where we're troubleshooting any of these issues.
1:32:02
So it is a comprehensive support in addition to the family advocacy piece, and I just wanted to name that because if we ignore the other aspects, then the family empowerment piece is not going to be truly supported.
Mercedes Narcisse
1:32:17
So I want to say thank you to you, and if you have anything you may add on that, you have something to add?
Christina Foti
1:32:25
Sure.
1:32:26
Just very quickly Councilmember Narcisse, we have three major ways that we've been engaging families of students with IEPs.
1:32:31
Number one, we've been doing our regular Beyond Access series.
1:32:34
We started that during COVID.
1:32:36
We get on average about 1,500 families that join us for those webinars regularly.
1:32:42
We've also reinvigorated our IEP parent member initiative where we are working with the state and our special education advisory council to make sure that we're recruiting more and more parents to participate in IEP meetings with other families on their behalf.
1:32:59
And that is a paid opportunity.
1:33:01
It's not significant, but it's a way that we try to compensate.
1:33:06
Saturday academies, we've been doing parent training during those as well at those seed and Saturday academy sites.
Mercedes Narcisse
1:33:12
And I wanna say thank you, and don't forget mental health.