Bill to revise special-education definitions draws heavy public comment and calls for rewrite

Rep. Yousef Kuttab (prime sponsor) introduced House Bill 699 to the House Education Policy and Administration Committee as an attempt to align New Hampshire statute and department rules with federal special-education law and to clarify which special-education environments require department approval.

Kuttab told the committee the bill was based on Department of Education recommendations following a special-education audit and said the measure aims chiefly to remove a partial, and potentially misleading, state definition of “related services” and to add a clarified definition of “specially designed instruction.” “The definition of related services being eliminated is not taking away related services from children,” Kuttab said, adding that the state would default to the federal definition in Department of Education rules.

Rebecca Fredette of the New Hampshire Department of Education emphasized the department’s intent to standardize language with federal citations. “We took out section 5 as it is verbatim the federal language in 34 CFR 300.34 related to related services… Students will still have the same rights and protections of the federal law in regards to related services,” Fredette said. She described the department’s effort to separate approval types — program approval vs.…