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Date: 2/22/2022
AMHERST – During the week of March 1, the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s (DESE) Office of Public-School Monitoring will conduct a Tiered Focused Monitoring Review of the Amherst-Pelham Regional School District.
The Office of Public-School Monitoring visits each district and charter school every three years to monitor compliance with federal and state special education and civil rights regulations. Areas of review related to special education included student assessments, determination of eligibility, as well as areas of review related to civil rights including bullying, student discipline, physical restraint and equal access to school programs for all students.
The Amherst-Pelham Regional School District will have a Group B review in March and currently does not have a corrective action plan for anything at this point, indicating they have had success meeting the standards in the review.
Stated on the Office of Public-School Monitoring’s page on doe.mass.edu, “District/charter schools are reviewed every three years through Tiered Focused Monitoring. This review process emphasizes elements most tied to student outcomes and alternates the focus of each review on either Group A Universal Standards or Group B Universal Standards.”
Group B Universal Standards address licensure and professional development, parent/student/community engagement, facilities and classroom observations, oversight, time and learning, and equal access.
Dr. Faye Brady, director of student services, and Marta Guevara, director of Student and Family Engagement, both work for the district schools and say it’s a group effort within the schools to uphold their requirements.
“[DESE] has a responsibility to oversee all public education districts in the commonwealth. They have many systems where they’re monitoring, overseeing, and supporting districts,” Brady said. “They have really shifted it to be more of a collaborative process where they’re partnering with districts to help ensure the processes and procedures that are in place in districts are compliant with the laws and regulations and are also focused on students’ wellbeing and progress.”
Brady added that while a review is conducted in a three-year cycle that they are monitoring different pieces of the school each visit. Last time the district was monitored on Group A Universal Standards that address student identification, Individualized Education Program development, programing and support services, and equal opportunity.
Guevara and Brady are responsible working together with the district in knowing the indicators that are guiding their practices and what DESE will be looking at in review. While Amherst has not faced any issues in complying, if there was an identified issue DESE would work with the school district closely in helping review the practices and see where they might need to be adapted to be fully compliant.
“The process has evolved and it’s a very collaborative effort. We meet with them for an initial review and we get all the parameters. It’s a major plus,” Guevara said. “It’s to make sure that we’re improving our practice and I think we do very well because a lot of it is staying up with any legal changes as it pertains to our practice.”
Brady added that the first step in this process is a self-assessment from the district. As DESE works with all districts to bring in different perspectives to review different practices, Brady said that the district learns more through a self-evaluation.
“We have to give them a lot of documents that we have already done within our self-assessment. It’s really that district wide self-reflection that isn’t just Marta and I, but it carries through all the personnel in the school,” Brady said.
DESE then receives their documents for review and then meet with the district for initial feedback. Brady said this showcases the partnership between DESE and the districts in making the best efforts toward compliance.
Brady also added that the school system has been attempting to reach out to the community and notifying them of this process so that if anyone would like to speak with monitors from DESE on things related to the review that they can reach out directly.
“Marta and I – and nobody in the district – is directly involved. Nobody has to check with us first. We don’t even know who’s talking to them, so they’re really getting a lot of very important feedback,” Brady said. “It could be a community member, it could be a family member, it could be a student directly. Student voices are exceptionally important in our work.”
The visit for the review comes after this point and the Office of Public-School monitoring comes in and can interview different people they have listed to speak to about the schools in that district. They also come in for an in-person tour to see the school and the different spaces used for things like special education and other student focused spaces.
The Amherst-Pelham Regional School District has not had any major issues identified in past reviews, but are still always focused on upholding the legal stature of the schools like Title IX and other pieces of law that change, said Guevara and Bradley.
“For the most part we’ve done really, really well because we are an open book and we take this seriously,” said Guevara. “We work really well with our own staff within our schools and central offices as well as with the community and the families and students.”
Following their visit, they have an exit interview with the district and give initial feedback and ask any other questions. Within approximately 60 business days after the on-site visit, the review chairperson will provide the district with a report containing information about areas in which the district meets or exceeds regulatory requirements and areas in which the district requires assistance to correct or improve practices. The reports are available to the public, including the last report for the Amherst-Pelham district, at http://www.doe.mass.edu/psm/tfm/reports/.