During a Feb. 24 board meeting, CISD staff gave an update on the challenges the district is facing in hiring speech language pathologists and diagnosticians who are qualified to conduct evaluations for students who may require special education services.
At the time of the presentation, CISD had seven vacancies for speech language pathologist assistants and four openings for diagnosticians.
“While we have felt the greatest impact recently, the staffing shortages have been an area of concern at the state and national level for over 10 years,” said Kristen Lueck, assistant superintendent of curriculum and instructional design for CISD.
Staffing shortages paired with an increase in referrals for initial evaluations for students to receive special education services have led CISD to hire external professionals to conduct evaluations, said Michele Martella, executive director of special education services in CISD, during the board meeting.
“We have a situation where the number of evaluations are increasing and the number of credentialed individuals able to conduct those evaluations are more limited,” Martella said. “We're really forced to go outside of our own district resources and seek relationships with vendors to provide those needed services.”
From August through January, 1,041 CISD students had been given referrals for evaluations, and 907 qualified for services. By comparison, the district received 911 referrals during the 2020-21 school year, and 705 of those students qualified for services.
In January, the NBISD board of trustees voted to extend the district’s contract with Trinity Education Services to provide supplemental personnel to conduct special education evaluations.
The district is short one diagnostician, and Kara Bock, assistant superintendent of curriculum and accountability for NBISD, said the contract was extended to ensure evaluations are completed according to federal timelines.
Both districts anticipate requiring additional services from external vendors this year, which would result in higher expenses to the district. Neither district provided estimates for the total cost of these services.
