Policy Manual
Gen Supervision

SECTION XI: RESPONSIBILITY OF THE STATE EDUCATION AGENCY FOR GENERAL SUPERVISION

A. Responsibility of State Educational Agency for All Programs.

  1. Under Public Law 3-9, “The Programs and Services for Handicapped Children Act of 1989” (amended 1996), “the Olbiil Era Kelulau recognizes that it is the obligation of the national government to provide educational services to all children to enable them to lead fulfilling and productive lives, and therefore declares that is the responsibility of the national government to provide full educational opportunities and necessary related services to each handicapped child in order to ensure that each handicapped child acquires the skills and knowledge necessary to lead a fulfilling and productive life as a citizen of the Republic...” “In order to accomplish this policy, the national government shall provide financial, material, and human resources, as well as coordinated and comprehensive administrative structures for the purpose of serving handicapped children, their families, and the agencies and organizations which serve them.”

  2. The Ministry of Education, consistent with IDEA ’04, is responsible for all education programs in the Republic.

B. Implementation Procedures.

  1. Through the policies described in this document as well as the “Administrative Policies and Procedures for the Implementation of Public Law 3-9” (amended 1994), the Palau MOE is responsible for ensuring that each educational program for children with disabilities administered within the Republic, including any programs administered by any other public agency, is under the general supervision of the Program Coordinator of the Special Education Program in the MOE.

  2. Interagency Agreements. The MOE Special Education Program, through existing cooperative agreements, works with the MOH, Head Start, and Ministry of Justice to ensure that students with disabilities receive a FAPE.

  3. Monitoring and General Supervision. Monitoring and evaluation of programs serving children with disabilities in Palau takes the form of direct administration of programs and direct supervision of program staff by the School Principal, Chief of School Management, and the Special Education Coordinator. The Special Education Coordinator additionally ensures compliance with ROP and Federal standards by assuring the implementation of a comprehensive system of monitoring and compliance, the Special Education General Supervision Continuous Improvement Focused Monitoring System.

Consistent with IDEA ’04, the focus of Special Education Program monitoring activities is on:

a. improving educational results and functional outcomes for all children with disabilities; and

b. ensuring that programs serving students with special needs meet program requirements of IDEA ’04 with a particular emphasis on those requirements that are most closely related to improving educational results for children with disabilities.

In exercising its monitoring responsibility the MOE must ensure that when it identifies noncompliance with the requirements of IDEA or P.L. 3-9, the noncompliance is corrected as soon as possible, and in no case later than one year after the identification of the noncompliance.

Monitoring activities also look closely at local progress in improving results on Palau’s compliance and performance indicators identified in its State Performance Plan (SPP) and detailed in Section XIV of these policies. The MOE Special Education Program has set annual targets for these indicators and progress is reported annually through the Annual Performance Report (APR) submitted to OSEP and also made available to the public. The MOE will, at a minimum, post the SPP on its Web site, and distribute the plan and reports to the media and through public agencies.

C. Reporting Requirements: Annual Report of Children Served. The MOE shall annually report to the U.S. Secretary of Education on the information required by Section 618 of IDEA ’04 at the times specified by the Secretary. The MOE shall submit the report on forms provided by the Secretary.

  1. Annual report of children served—information required in the report:

a. For purposes of the annual report required by section 618 of IDEA ’04, the Republic must count and report the number of children with disabilities receiving special education and related services on any date between October 1 and December 1 of each year.

b. For the purpose of this report, a child’s age is the child’s actual age on the date of the child count.

c. The MOE may not report a child under more than one disability category.

d. If a child with a disability has more than one disability, the MOE shall report that child in accordance with the following procedure:

(1) If a child has only two disabilities and those disabilities are deafness and blindness, and the child is not reported as having a developmental delay, that child must be reported under the category “deaf-blindness."

(2) A child who has more than one disability and is not reported as having deaf-blindness or as having a developmental delay must be reported under the category “multiple disabilities."

  1. Data Reporting: Protection of Personally Identifiable Data. The data described in section 618(a) of IDEA ’04 and in Sec. 300.641of IDEA ’04 regulations shall be publicly reported by ROP in a manner that does not result in disclosure of data identifiable to individual children.

  2. Annual Report of Children Served—Certification. The MOE shall include in its report a certification signed by an authorized official of the MOE that the information provided is an accurate and unduplicated count of children with disabilities receiving special education and related services on the dates in question.

  3. Annual Report of Children Served—Criteria for Counting Children. The MOE may include in its report children with disabilities who are enrolled in a school or program that is operated or supported by a public agency, and that:

a. provides them with both special education and related services that meet ROP standards;

b. provides them only with special education, if a related service is not required, that meets ROP standards; or

c. in the case of children with disabilities enrolled by their parents in private schools, counts those children who are eligible under IDEA ’04 and receive special education or related services or both that meet ROP standards.

  1. Annual Report of Children Served—Other Responsibilities of the MOE. In addition to meeting the other requirements described above the MOE shall:

a. Establish procedures to be used in counting the number of children with disabilities receiving special education and related services;

b. Set dates by which schools must report to the MOE to ensure that the MOE can submit reports in a timely manner;

c. Obtain certification from school or other agencies that an unduplicated and accurate count has been made;

d. Aggregate the data from the count obtained from each school or other agency, and prepare the reports required above; and

e. Ensure that documentation is maintained that enables the ROP and the U.S. Secretary of Education to audit the accuracy of the count.